Meet the world’s animals.

Photos: 12,673 · Stories: 19,540

• Hispid Cotton Rat Sigmodon (Sigmodon) hispidus

  

  This cotton rat makes runways through dense grass. Its tail has sparse hair, and its coat color varies across the range.

• Stark's Lark Spizocorys starki

  This small lark inhabits dry country and is nomadic, moving after rain. Outside the breeding season it may gather in large flocks.

• White-tipped Thomasomys Thomasomys caudivarius

  Thomasomys caudivarius is a mouse of the western Andes from Ecuador to northern Peru. It has soft brown back fur and a long tail with a white tip. It is described as nocturnal and terrestrial, feeding on seeds and insects.

• Green-and-black Fruiteater Pipreola riefferii

  The Green-and-black Fruiteater eats fruit in the canopy and middle levels of Andean montane forest. Males in northern Peru show striking green and black plumage.

• Brush Deermouse Peromyscus boylii

  The brush deermouse has a brown back, a pale underside, and a long tail with a tufted tip. It is active at night and uses trees and rock crevices.

• Little Sparrowhawk Tachyspiza minulla

  This small woodland raptor is marked by a white rump. It darts among trees while hunting small birds and other small animals.

• Orizaba Deermouse Peromyscus beatae

  The Orizaba Deermouse ranges from southeastern Mexico into Central America. It has been recorded in humid mountain forests.

• Sumichrast's Wren Hylorchilus sumichrasti

  Sumichrast's Wren is a wren restricted to limestone areas of southern Mexico. It probes rock crevices with its long bill.

• Pine Vole Microtus (Pitymys) pinetorum

  A small vole that moves through leaf litter and soil in deciduous forests. In autumn it stores roots and shoots in burrows for winter shortages.

• White-shouldered Fairywren Malurus alboscapulatus

  The White-shouldered Fairywren is a bird of New Guinea that lives in open habitats such as grassland and marshes.

• Jelski's Altiplano Mouse Abrothrix jelskii

  This altiplano mouse lives in the high grasslands of the central Andes. Its coat and activity period vary.

• Gray Catbird Dumetella carolinensis

  A gray bird with a black cap and rusty feathers beneath the tail. It lives in dense thickets and weaves other birds' sounds into long songs.

• Abyssinian Ground Thrush Geokichla piaggiae

  This ground thrush is marked by an orange head and breast, olive-brown upperparts, and a white eye-ring. It searches for fruit and small prey in the lower parts of mountain forest.

• Fulvous Shrike-Tanager Lanio fulvus

  A tanager of humid lowland forests in northern Amazonia. It acts as a sentinel near the center of mixed-species flocks and catches insects flushed by other birds.

• Aldabra Fody Foudia aldabrana

  This small bird lives on Aldabra Atoll in Seychelles. Males have a bright red head, neck, and breast, sharply set off from a sulphur-yellow belly. Skerrett’s 1999 article also discusses the older name F. eminentissima aldabrana; this entry follows the pool name F. aldabrana.

• Cassin's Vireo Vireo cassinii

  This small bird breeds in dry, open forests of western North America. Its white eye-ring is conspicuous, and it forages slowly through the lower and middle parts of trees. In winter it may join mixed flocks of woodland birds.

• Mangrove Robin Peneoenanthe pulverulenta

  The Mangrove Robin is a grey robin known from coastal forests of New Guinea and northern Australia. A study in Australia's Northern Territory also reported a breeding population in wetland vegetation away from mangroves.

• Dusky-tailed Antbird Drymophila malura

  This long-tailed antbird is associated with dense understory in humid forest, as well as woodland and forest edges.

• Shelley's Rufous-sparrow Passer shelleyi

  This sparrow was documented in Ruma National Park, south-west Kenya, in 2017. Males show a white cheek and a black line behind the eye; the report also describes a nest in an acacia tree.

• Desert Cisticola Cisticola aridulus

  The Desert Cisticola is a small bird of dry grassland and scrub. During breeding, males and females differ in their crown pattern and forage in low grass.

• Olive-streaked Flycatcher Mionectes olivaceus

  This flycatcher occurs in montane forest on the eastern Andean slope. The Peru Aves account says it forages at different heights along forest edges and in second growth.

• Zimmer's Tapaculo Scytalopus zimmeri

  Zimmer's Tapaculo is a small ground-level bird of humid ravines and open woodland on the eastern Andes. A white throat and pale eyebrow stand out; it is usually alone or in pairs and is often heard before it is seen. This account is limited to southern Andean records in Bolivia and neighboring northwestern Argentina.

• Beautiful Fruit Dove Ptilinopus pulchellus

  The Beautiful Fruit Dove is a small pigeon of rainforests on New Guinea and nearby islands. It plucks fruit from the ends of branches.

• Ameline Swiftlet Aerodramus amelis

  The Ameline Swiftlet occurs on Philippine islands and Balambangan Island off northern Borneo. It flies over forests and open habitats.