Meet the world’s animals.

Photos: 12,824 · Stories: 19,540

• Pacific swift Apus pacificus

  

  A long-winged bird that catches insects in flight and visits Japan in summer.

• Sumatran Serow Capricornis sumatraensis

  The Sumatran serow has a dark coat and backward-pointing horns. It lives mainly in mountain forests and near cliffs.

• Eastern Black-headed Batis Batis minor

  The Eastern Black-headed Batis is a small, dark bird with a sharply defined white eyebrow. It searches for insects in the dry forests and savannas of East Africa.

• Lesser Asiatic Yellow Bat Scotophilus kuhlii

  Its back is brown and its underside is paler. It has been reported roosting in groups in buildings and trees in towns and villages, and flying early in the evening.

• Churring Cisticola Cisticola njombe

  This cisticola inhabits high-altitude grassland. A record from Kitulo in Tanzania's southern highlands includes a bird identified as njombe.

• Piute Ground Squirrel Urocitellus mollis

  The Piute ground squirrel ranges around the Great Basin and nearby arid regions. It has an unstriped back and inconspicuous ears and tail.

• Common Poorwill Phalaenoptilus nuttallii

  The Common Poorwill rests on the ground or low branches by day and catches flying insects at night.

• Philippine Forest Rat Rattus everetti

  This rat has a gray to gray-brown back and a pale underside. In a southern Luzon survey, most captures came from less disturbed mid- and high-elevation forest.

• Nava's Wren Hylorchilus navai

  This wren lives among limestone outcrops in lowland evergreen forest in Mexico. It searches for small invertebrates on rocks and in crevices.

• Eastern Harvest Mouse Reithrodontomys (Reithrodontomys) humulis

  This small mouse uses grassland and early-successional habitats, is mainly nocturnal, and builds grass-fiber nests.

• Gray-faced buzzard Butastur indicus

  A slender-winged migratory hawk seen around woodland and farmland in Japan.

• Tibetan antelope Pantholops hodgsonii

  An animal of the high Tibetan Plateau with a fine, soft undercoat.

• Heuglin's Masked Weaver Ploceus heuglini

  This weaver ranges from the Sahel to western East Africa. It uses dry savanna woodland, thickets, scrub, and areas around farms and villages, and is thought to feed mostly on arthropods.

• Chinese Pipistrelle Hypsugo pulveratus

  The Chinese pipistrelle is a small bat recorded in China. A university species page describes its coat and forest records, along with examples of roosting in buildings.

• Oriental Cuckoo Cuculus optatus

  The Oriental Cuckoo is a migratory cuckoo that breeds in forests. Females include both grey and rufous plumage forms.

• Gray Marmot Marmota (Marmota) baibacina

  This marmot lives in the highlands of the Altai and Tian Shan and spends much of the cold season hibernating.

• Himalayan Cutia Cutia nipalensis

  An older account describes male nominate Himalayan Cutias as flocking in high-elevation forest in summer and moving lower in winter.

• Mitchell's Hopping Mouse Notomys mitchellii

  This small mouse of Australia’s dry country has a sandy to rufous back, white underside, and a dark tail tuft. It uses burrows or fallen timber and eats plant material, seeds, fungi, and insects.

• White-cheeked Tern Sterna repressa

  The White-cheeked Tern is a coastal seabird marked by white cheeks and a dark cap and feeds on fish and other marine prey.

• Dusky Melanomys Melanomys caliginosus

  The dusky melanomys is a rodent of forests in western Colombia and southwestern Ecuador. Its back is generally dark, although coat color varies geographically. The 2017 species account says its broad taxonomic concept needs further revision.

• Flame-fronted Barbet Psilopogon armillaris

  The Flame-fronted Barbet lives in humid forests on Java and Bali. Its green body contrasts with blue and reddish colors on the head.

• Nilgai Boselaphus tragocamelus

  A large antelope of the Indian subcontinent that is active by day in grassland and woodland.

• Sri Lanka Drongo Dicrurus lophorinus

  This drongo is endemic to Sri Lanka and lacks the long bare-shafted tail rackets of the Greater Racket-tailed Drongo. One study observed nesting pairs removing foliage around their host tree.

• African Yellow Bat Scotophilus dinganii

  The African Yellow Bat has a yellowish underside and eats insects. It roosts in hollow trees and buildings, alone or in small groups.