Meet the world’s animals.

Photos: 12,038 · Stories: 19,488

• Osprey Pandion haliaetus

  

  A fish-catching raptor with a white head crossed by a dark eye stripe. On Hachijojima it is seen near the coast in winter.

• Short-legged Ground Roller Brachypteracias leptosomus

  

  The Short-legged Ground Roller lives in Madagascar's humid forests. By day, it searches for invertebrates on the leaf-littered forest floor.

• Roman Snail Helix pomatia

  

  Helix pomatia has a large rounded shell, cream-colored with faint brown bands. Its native range is in central and southeastern Europe, and it lives in woods, hedgerows, and tall vegetation.

• Harbor porpoise Phocoena phocoena

  

  A small porpoise of cool Northern Hemisphere waters. It uses bays and estuaries and mainly eats schooling fish.

• Tri-spine horseshoe crab Tachypleus tridentatus

  

  A coastal animal of East and Southeast Asia with a hard shell and long tail. It lays eggs on sandy shores, and young animals grow on tidal flats.

• Manuel's Cellar Spider Pholcus manueli

  

  Recorded widely in Asia and the United States, females of this spider have slightly more closely spaced eye groups than males.

• White wagtail Motacilla alba

  A bird that walks in search of insects along watersides and farmland in Japan. Birds commonly seen there have white faces with a dark line through the eye.

• Peters' Mouse Lemur Microcebus myoxinus

  Peters's mouse lemur is a small primate of western Madagascar. At night it searches for fruit and insects in trees, usually foraging alone.

• Plotocnide borealis

  This animal has a swimming medusa and a minute mud-dwelling polyp. DNA research connected forms that had been treated as separate species.

• Amazon river dolphin Inia geoffrensis

  A long-beaked dolphin that lives in freshwater in the Amazon basin.

• St. Johann's Tree Snake Lycodryas maculatus

  A tree snake from Anjouan and Mayotte in the Comoros archipelago, mainly active at night.

• Japanese fire-bellied newt Cynops pyrrhogaster

  A newt of rice fields and ponds on Honshu, Shikoku and Kyushu, with a dark back and a red belly patterned in black.

• Common Swift Apus apus

  A summer visitor to the UK, the Common Swift spends almost all its life on the wing, catching small insects and spiders in the air.

• Common earthworm Lumbricus terrestris

  An earthworm that makes deep burrows, feeding on leaf litter at the surface and sometimes pulling it underground. It connects life above and below the soil.

• Elkhorn coral Acropora palmata

  These branching structures belong to an animal, not a plant. Elkhorn coral grows in shallow Caribbean waters; thickets shelter fish and other creatures.

• House mouse Mus (Mus) musculus

  A small mouse living in houses, farms and cultivated fields.

• Common Cuttlefish Sepia officinalis

  The common cuttlefish has a broad oval body with fins along its sides. It lives in shallow seas and offshore waters, with records from the North Sea region to southeastern Africa.

• Choirboys Pycnoclavella narcissus

  A colonial sea squirt described from Algoa Bay, South Africa, with swollen tips on branching stalks.

• Eurasian Hoopoe Upupa epops

  A bird with a raised crest, an orange-beige body, and bold black-and-white wings.

• Madeira Firecrest Regulus madeirensis

  A small bird of Madeira's forests and uplands. Its crown is a key mark, and it searches among leaves for tiny insects.

• Troglohyphantes pedemontanus

  A small spider of caves in north-western Italy, known from three caves in Piemonte.

• Beluga whale Delphinapterus leucas

  An Arctic whale that becomes white as it matures. It has a rounded forehead and no dorsal fin.

• Brumback's Night Monkey Aotus brumbacki

  Brumback’s night monkey is a nocturnal primate described as endemic to Colombia’s Llanos. It sleeps in cavities in both living and dead trees.

• Brown Tree Lizard Anolis sagrei

  This lizard is native to Caribbean islands and parts of Central America. It is often brown, with darker markings on its back.