Low
The overwhelming majority of life on Earth. Harmless to humans, and frequently far more interesting for it.
Beluga Whale
Nicknamed the "sea canary" for its squeals and chirps, with an unfused neck and a bulbous forehead that can break through ice for a breath.
Bigfin Squid
The deepest-dwelling squid on record, with elbow-bent arms trailing sticky filaments that may stretch up to 20 times its body length.
Bighorn Sheep
Horns weighing up to thirty pounds, head-first charges at up to forty mph, and hooves shaped to snag any slight protrusion.
Black Ghost Knifefish
A nocturnal South American fish that senses its surroundings through a continuous electric field around its own body.
Black Swan
Australia's red-billed swan, whose black plumage is linked to a pigment gene that is cut short in the white mute swan.
Black-Footed Cat
One of the world's smallest cats, with a hunting success rate of around 60 percent and an appetite for a fifth of its own body weight a day.
Black-Tailed Jackrabbit
A desert hare that zigzags at up to 40 miles per hour and eats its own droppings for a second pass at its food.
Black-Tailed Prairie Dog
A keystone rodent that digs towns of multi-chamber burrows, and whose shrill jump-yip seems to set off the neighbors.
Blobfish
Nicknamed Mr Blobby by the scientists and crew of the research vessel Tangaroa after it was trawled from the Norfolk Ridge in 2003, and now held in the Australian Museum's collection.
Blue Jay
A crested jay that can imitate the scream of a Red-shouldered Hawk. In one Virginia study, blue jays cached 133,000 acorns from one stand of oaks.
Blue Whale
The largest animal that has ever lived, built to gulp krill-laden water by the ton and rated among the loudest animals on the planet.
Blue-and-Yellow Macaw
A blue-and-gold parrot that blushes red, crushes nuts and seeds in its beak, and drops in on riverbank clay licks to eat soil.
Blue-Footed Booby
Bright blue webbed feet, a high-stepping courtship walk, and plunge-dives that hit the water at up to 60 mph.
Bold Jumping Spider
A daytime stalker from a spider family whose forward-looking resolution beats every insect's, trailing a safety line of silk when it jumps.
Bowhead Whale
A bow-shaped skull that breaks through sea ice, DNA-repair genes that may help it resist cancer, and a lifespan estimated at over two centuries.
Brazilian Treehopper
A rainforest sap-drinker wearing a crown of glossy globes on slender horns, argued over by entomologists since 1903.
Brown Marmorated Stink Bug
The shield-shaped bug whose name points to its scent glands, a fruit-eating invader from east Asia that has reached North America and Europe.
Brown Rat
A whisker-guided survivor that breeds all year and quickly learns to shun the taste of food that once made it ill.
Budgerigar
The nomadic outback parrot that rewrites its own call to match a brand-new mate.
Buff-Tailed Bumblebee
A short-tongued bumblebee that bites holes in flowers to steal nectar, and nests underground in colonies of up to 600.
Calanus Copepod
A small North Atlantic copepod whose oil sac fuels a winter sleep in deep water.
Canada Goose
North America's most widely distributed goose, with Hawaiian relatives that included a flightless giant over four times larger than the nene.
Canada Lynx
A snowshoe-pawed wild cat of the northern forests whose numbers rise and fall with the snowshoe hares it eats.
Capybara
Up to 66 kilograms (145 pounds) of South American zen diplomat, calm enough to let birds pick parasitic insects out of its fur.