Meet the world’s animals.

Photos: 12,673 · Stories: 19,540

• Mountain Tapir Tapirus pinchaque

  

  The mountain tapir lives in the Andes of northern South America and has a thick coat suited to its cold mountain home.

• Altai Accentor Prunella himalayana

  The Altai Accentor breeds in the mountains of Central Asia and moves into the Himalayas outside the breeding season. It feeds on rocky slopes, often in flocks.

• Guianan Long-nosed Armadillo Dasypus guianensis

  Dasypus guianensis is an armadillo described after populations on the Guiana Shield were separated from a close relative. The original paper combined genetic data and museum-specimen morphology and places the range from northern Brazil through the Guianas to eastern Venezuela.

• Andean Flamingo Phoenicoparrus andinus

  A flamingo of high Andean lakes, it has a pale pink body and yellow legs and filters algae and other small food from the water.

• Apennine Chamois Rupicapra ornata

  The Apennine chamois lives in central Italy. It uses high grasslands and steep rocky slopes, descending into valley woodland in winters with heavy snow.

• Velvet Asity Philepitta castanea

  The Velvet Asity lives in Madagascar's forests, and breeding males look very different from females. Males raise the structures above their eyes during courtship.

• Ross Seal Ommatophoca rossii

  The Ross seal breeds in dense Antarctic pack ice. Six seals tracked off Queen Maud Land moved into open water after their February moult and returned to the pack ice in October.

• Dusky Broadbill Corydon sumatranus

  The Dusky Broadbill is a forest bird of Southeast Asia, with a heavy bill, dark plumage, and a pale throat. It gathers in small groups in the canopy.

• Falanouc Eupleres goudotii

  The falanouc is a Malagasy carnivore with a narrow muzzle and a thick tail. It searches for earthworms and other small prey at night in humid lowland forests.

• Woodchat Shrike Lanius senator

  The male Woodchat Shrike has a reddish-orange head and striking black-and-white markings. During breeding it hunts insects in open, sparsely wooded places, then winters in Africa.

• Kolar Leaf-nosed Bat Hipposideros hypophyllus

  The Kolar Leaf-nosed Bat is known from southern India. It has broad ears and small supplementary noseleaf structures, and a cave in dry scrubland is its only reported roost.

• Golden-bellied Gerygone Gerygone sulphurea

  The Golden-bellied Gerygone is a small bird with a gray-brown back and yellow underparts. It occurs in many tree-filled places, including cities, across parts of Southeast Asia.

• Anderson's Four-eyed Opossum Philander andersoni

  This opossum occurs in northwestern South America. It uses lowland primary and secondary forests and riparian forest, and is mostly terrestrial.

• Chestnut-tailed Starling Sturnia malabarica

  The Chestnut-tailed Starling is a small, pale starling with chestnut on the tail tips and sides near the vent.

• Buffy Saki Pithecia albicans

  The buffy saki occurs in Amazonas State in northern Brazil. It eats many fruits and can obtain seeds from fruits with hard coverings.

• Black-eared Catbird Ailuroedus melanotis

  The Black-eared Catbird is a bowerbird with a green body, dark head markings, and cream-colored spots. It eats both animal and plant foods.

• Brazilian Free-tailed Bat Tadarida brasiliensis

  The Brazilian free-tailed bat has a tail tip that projects beyond the tail membrane. Groups that arrive in central Texas each spring are well documented.

• Siberian Nuthatch Sitta arctica

  A 2006 taxonomic study examined the Siberian form arctica within the Eurasian Nuthatch group and supported treating it as a separate species. That form has dark bluish-grey upperparts, a white belly centre and chestnut flanks. A current species account lists forest habitat and invertebrates as food, but the taxonomic study says ecological information about arctica remains fragmentary.

• Narrow-ridged finless porpoise Neophocaena asiaeorientalis

  A small porpoise without a dorsal fin, found along parts of the Japanese coast.

• Indochinese Fulvetta Fulvetta danisi

  The Indochinese Fulvetta is a small bird of mountain forest in Laos and Vietnam. It searches for small invertebrates in the lower forest and bamboo. The account used here gives no breeding information.

• Black Crested Gibbon Nomascus concolor

  A gibbon of mountain forests in southwestern China and nearby areas. Adult males and females have very different coat colors.

• Usambara Hyliota Hyliota usambara

  The Usambara Hyliota has a blue-black back and a white wing patch. A 1999 survey recorded it singly or in pairs, usually in the canopy of mature trees at forest edges in Tanzania’s East Usambaras. That paper used the older subspecies name Hyliota (australis) usambarae and said its status as a separate species was unresolved at the time.

• Townsend's Ground Squirrel Urocitellus townsendii

  A ground squirrel of grasslands and sagebrush in southeastern Washington. It is gray and unspotted, with reddish coloring beneath its short tail.

• Spotted Quail-thrush Cinclosoma punctatum

  The Spotted Quail-thrush blends into the ground of dry, open woodland. Males have a black face and throat with a white eyebrow, and birds are usually seen alone or in pairs.