Scottish wildcat (Felis silvestris grampia) With distinctive black bands around its large, fluffy tail, a large jaw and a wide, flat head, the Scottish wildcat is one of our most endangered animals. This solitary mammal inhabits wooded areas, moorland, pasture and rocky outcrops in the Scottish Highlands.
The golden eagle has become a national icon, and white-tailed eagles and ospreys have recently re-colonised the land. The Scottish crossbill is the only endemic vertebrate species in the UK.
Vaquita. On the brink of extinction, the vaquita is the smallest living species of cetacean. The single rarest animal in the world is the vaquita (Phocoena sinus).
The rarest animal in the world is the vaquita (Phocoena sinus). It is a kind of critically endangered porpoise that only lives in the furthest north-western corner of the Gulf of California in Mexico. There are only 18 left in the world.
The vaquita, a small porpoise found only in Mexico's Gulf of California, now faces extinction, scientists say in a report published today. Only about 30 individuals remain, according to an acoustic survey that counted the animals' clicking noises last summer.
3. Boto/Pink River Dolphin. Place 3 for Rarest animals in the world. The Amazon river dolphin, also known as the pink river dolphin or boto, lives only in freshwater.
To date, there's only one species that has been called 'biologically immortal': the jellyfish Turritopsis dohrnii. These small, transparent animals hang out in oceans around the world and can turn back time by reverting to an earlier stage of their life cycle.
The honey badger is not afraid of anything.
The most famous one on the list, the dodo was a small flightless bird that got extinct 100 years after its discovery. Due to the importation of cats, dog, and macaques, the bird became easy prey to cats and dogs, besides hunters, and the macaques ate the dodo's eggs, killing them out completely in a short time.
Dragons in Scottish Myths and Legends
Then from the murky depths of Loch Ness comes the most famous of Scotland's mythical creatures. Yes, Nessie is classified as a dragon although she may be a member of that legendary species, the each-uisge or water horse.
In the UK, apex predators include foxes, otters, owls and eagles. Other ecosystems around the world have even bigger ones, including lions, polar bears and great white sharks.
From inter-glacial times (roughly 50,000 years ago), before the complete formation of the seas that now separate Scotland and the rest of Britain from the European continent, until the beginning or even the middle of the 18th century, wolves were part of the natural wild fauna of what is now called Scotland.
The unicorn has been linked with Scotland for centuries. Famously known as wild, fierce, bold and resilient, the Scots adopted the mythical creature as its national animal. Firstly, the unicorn was featured on the Scottish royal coat of arms by William I in the 12th century.
The most well-known of Scotland's creatures, Nessie otherwise known as the Loch Ness monster. After the reported sighting and photographic evidence (though later revealed as hoax) of the monster in 1934 people have done their best to catch a glimpse of the creature.
The brown bear (Ursus arctos) was once widespread across Britain, found in the wild from Devon in southern England to Sutherland in northern Scotland. However, by the end of the last Ice Age, populations had dwindled and it had become rare.
Apex predators, such as this leopard (Panthera pardus) outside of Mumbai, often fear humans. As they change their behaviors to avoid the stress of human contact, a cascade of ecological effects results.
“This confirms the general agreement in the literature that snakes and spiders are the most intensively feared animals in humans with the highest prevalence in the general population.” Bulls (3.84 points) were not too far behind, however.
Dogs have olfactory superpowers that can detect a human's emotional state by the scent that a human emits. That's right—you can't hide fear from dogs.
Flatworms, nematodes, and cnidarians (jellyfish, sea anemones, and corals) do not have a circulatory system and thus do not have blood. Their body cavity has no lining or fluid within it.
Snails have more teeth than any animal.
A snail's mouth is no larger than the head of a pin, but can have over 25,000 teeth (but these aren't like regular teeth, they are on its tongue).
But the bullfrog, Lithobates catesbeianus show the same reaction in both situations. This indicates that bullfrogs do not sleep. Lithobates catesbeianus is an animal that cannot sleep.
Vaquita, the world's rarest marine mammal, is on the edge of extinction. The plight of cetaceans—whales, dolphins, and porpoises—as a whole is exemplified by the rapid decline of the vaquita in Mexico, with about 10 individuals remaining.