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Coasts & shorelines

Coastlines — beaches, cliffs, estuaries, and kelp fringes — are tidal edge habitats that concentrate feeding, breeding, and migration traffic.

58 animals in this habitat

Fish LC Archerfish Toxotes jaculatrix The archerfish hunts by spitting a precise jet of water to knock insects off overhanging leaves — correcting for the way light bends at the surface, and learning the skill by watching other fish. Read the guide →
Birds LC Arctic Tern Sterna paradisaea The Arctic tern makes the longest migration of any animal — a zigzag round trip of up to 90,000 km a year between the Arctic and Antarctic, so it sees two summers and endless daylight. Read the guide →
Fish LC Atlantic Bluefin Tuna Thunnus thynnus The Atlantic bluefin tuna is a warm-blooded ocean sprinter that can weigh 700 kg, cross the Atlantic in weeks, and sell for over a million dollars a fish — which nearly wiped it out. Read the guide →
Fish LC Atlantic Mudskipper Periophthalmus barbarus The Atlantic mudskipper is a fish that spends most of its life out of water, walking on its fins across mudflats, breathing through its skin and mouth, and defending a burrow it digs with its jaws. Read the guide →
Birds VU Atlantic Puffin Fratercula arctica The Atlantic puffin is a small seabird that flies underwater to catch fish, carries dozens of them crosswise in its bill, and spends most of the year alone far out on the open ocean. Read the guide →
Fish EN Basking Shark Cetorhinus maximus The basking shark is the second-largest fish alive — a 7-to-8-metre plankton strainer that swims with its metre-wide mouth open, filtering 2,000 tonnes of water an hour, and gathers in mysterious. Read the guide →
Fish LC Blue Tang Paracanthurus hepatus The blue tang is the electric-blue reef fish made famous as Dory. It plays dead when threatened, carries a scalpel-sharp blade at the base of its tail, and is one of the hardest marine fish to breed. Read the guide →
Invertebrates NE Box Jellyfish Chironex fleckeri The Australian box jellyfish carries enough venom to kill a person in minutes, hunts actively with 24 eyes, and swims rather than drifts. Learn what makes this cube-shaped animal so deadly. Read the guide →
Mammals LC Brown Rat Rattus norvegicus The brown rat is one of the most successful mammals on Earth — a smart, social, adaptable rodent that reached every continent by ship, shows empathy and ticklishness, and became the lab rat. Read the guide →
Fish VU Bull Shark Carcharhinus leucas The bull shark is the shark that swims up rivers — hundreds or thousands of kilometres into fresh water. Learn how it survives there, why it's rated among the most dangerous sharks, and its status. Read the guide →
Birds CR California Condor Gymnogyps californianus The California condor is the largest flying bird in North America, with a 3-metre wingspan. In 1987 just 22 were left; the wild population is now over 300 after decades of captive breeding. Read the guide →
Mammals LC California Sea Lion Zalophus californianus The California sea lion is the barking pinniped of Pacific piers and marine parks — a fast, agile, intelligent swimmer that walks on all fours on land and can learn abstract logic. Read the guide →
Fish LC Clownfish Amphiprion ocellaris The clownfish lives inside the stinging tentacles of a sea anemone, protected by a special mucus coat. Every clownfish is born male, and the largest in each group turns female. Read the guide →
Invertebrates VU Coconut Crab Birgus latro The coconut crab is the largest land invertebrate on Earth, a 4-kilogram hermit crab relative that climbs trees, husks coconuts with the strongest pinch ever measured, and drowns if held underwater. Read the guide →
Birds LC Common Kingfisher Alcedo atthis The common kingfisher is a jewel-bright riverbank bird that dives head-first into water to spear fish. Read the guide →
Invertebrates LC Cuttlefish Sepia officinalis The common cuttlefish is a colour-blind master of camouflage that changes its skin pattern in a heartbeat, hypnotises prey with moving stripes, and floats using a chambered internal shell. Read the guide →
Reptiles LC Eastern Diamondback Rattlesnake Crotalus adamanteus The eastern diamondback is the largest venomous snake in North America and the heaviest rattlesnake on Earth. It warns before it strikes, shelters in tortoise burrows, and is declining fast. Read the guide →
Birds LC Flamingo Phoenicopterus roseus The flamingo is a filter-feeding wading bird that eats with its head upside down, gets its pink colour entirely from its food, and breeds in colonies tens of thousands strong on caustic salt lakes. Read the guide →
Birds LC Gentoo Penguin Pygoscelis papua The gentoo penguin is the fastest bird in the water, hitting 36 km/h underwater, and it courts its mate with a gift of pebbles. Learn how gentoos live at the edge of Antarctica. Read the guide →
Fish LC Great Barracuda Sphyraena barracuda The great barracuda is a torpedo-shaped reef predator with fang-like teeth that strikes at up to 40 km/h. It is curious about swimmers but rarely bites, and its flesh can carry ciguatera poisoning. Read the guide →
Fish CR Great Hammerhead Shark Sphyrna mokarran The great hammerhead is the largest hammerhead shark, using its wing-shaped head to detect and pin stingrays on the seabed. Once common, it is now Critically Endangered from the fin trade. Read the guide →
Fish LC Green Moray Eel Gymnothorax funebris The green moray is a large Atlantic reef eel that is actually brown — a yellow mucus coat makes it look green. It has a second set of jaws in its throat that lunge forward to grab prey. Read the guide →
Mammals LC Humpback Whale Megaptera novaeangliae The humpback whale sings songs that evolve and spread across oceans, blows nets of bubbles to trap fish, and migrates up to 8,000 km between polar feeding grounds and tropical breeding waters. Read the guide →
Birds LC King Penguin Aptenodytes patagonicus The king penguin is the second-largest penguin, with the longest breeding cycle of any bird — over a year per chick. Learn how its brown, woolly-looking chicks survive a sub-Antarctic winter. Read the guide →
Reptiles VU Leatherback Sea Turtle Dermochelys coriacea The leatherback is the largest turtle on Earth and the deepest-diving reptile — a jellyfish hunter that keeps its body warm in near-freezing seas and crosses whole oceans to nest. Read the guide →
Mammals LC Leopard Seal Hydrurga leptonyx The leopard seal is Antarctica's top seal predator — a huge, reptilian-headed hunter that kills penguins and other seals but also filters krill through its teeth. Learn how this loner lives. Read the guide →
Reptiles VU Loggerhead Sea Turtle Caretta caretta The loggerhead is the world's most abundant sea turtle, a big-headed shellfish-crusher that navigates whole ocean basins using the Earth's magnetic field as a map to return to its home beach. Read the guide →
Birds LC Mallard Anas platyrhynchos The mallard is the most widespread duck on Earth and the ancestor of nearly every domestic breed. It dabbles for food, sleeps with half its brain awake, and hybridises freely. Read the guide →
Fish EN Manta Ray Mobula birostris The manta ray is the largest ray in the sea — a 7-metre, plankton-eating fish with the biggest brain of any fish and a curiosity about divers. Learn how it feeds, breeds, and why it is Endangered. Read the guide →
Reptiles VU Marine Iguana Amblyrhynchus cristatus The marine iguana of the Galápagos is the only lizard that forages in the sea, grazing algae off the seabed, sneezing out salt, and shrinking its own skeleton when food runs short. Read the guide →
Fish VU Ocean Sunfish Mola mola The ocean sunfish is the heaviest bony fish in the world, a flattened disc with no tail that can weigh over two tonnes, basks on its side at the surface, and lays more eggs than any other vertebrate. Read the guide →
Invertebrates LC Peacock Mantis Shrimp Odontodactylus scyllarus The peacock mantis shrimp throws the fastest punch in the animal kingdom, boiling the water around it, and sees with the most complex eyes known — 12 to 16 colour channels against a human's three. Read the guide →
Birds LC Peregrine Falcon Falco peregrinus The peregrine falcon is the fastest animal on the planet, hitting nearly 390 km/h in a hunting dive. Learn how its body survives that speed and how it came back from near-extinction. Read the guide →
Invertebrates NE Portuguese Man o' War Physalia physalis The Portuguese man o' war looks like a jellyfish but is not even one animal — it is a floating colony of four kinds of specialised organism that cannot survive apart, trailing long stinging tentacles. Read the guide →
Fish LC Red Lionfish Pterois volitans The red lionfish is a striped Indo-Pacific reef fish armed with venomous spines. Released into the Atlantic by the aquarium trade, it has become one of the most damaging marine invasions on record. Read the guide →
Fish LC Reef Stonefish Synanceia verrucosa The reef stonefish is the most venomous fish in the world — 13 spines loaded with a toxin that causes agonising pain and can kill. It looks exactly like an encrusted rock on the reef floor. Read the guide →
Birds LC Rock Pigeon Columba livia The rock pigeon was the first bird humans domesticated, carried messages through two world wars, and can navigate home over hundreds of kilometres using magnetism, smell, the sun, and infrasound. Read the guide →
Mammals EN Sea Otter Enhydra lutris The sea otter has no blubber and survives the cold Pacific on the densest fur of any animal, using rocks to crack shellfish. Learn how it keeps kelp forests alive — and why it is Endangered. Read the guide →
Fish VU Seahorse Hippocampus kuda The seahorse is a fish that swims upright, grips seagrass with a monkey-like tail, and in which the male carries the pregnancy. Learn how this slow, armoured ambush hunter lives. Read the guide →
Fish EN Spotted Eagle Ray Aetobatus narinari The spotted eagle ray is a graceful, leopard-spotted ray that "flies" through open water, digs clams and conch out of the seabed with a duck-like snout, and leaps clear of the surface in big jumps. Read the guide →
Fish LC Swordfish Xiphias gladius The swordfish uses its long flat bill to slash through schools of fish, warms its eyes and brain with a special organ so it can hunt in the cold deep, and is one of the fastest fish in the sea. Read the guide →
Fish NT Tiger Shark Galeocerdo cuvier The tiger shark eats almost anything — turtles, seabirds, dolphins, other sharks, and the occasional car tyre. Learn how its serrated teeth and roaming lifestyle make it a key ocean predator. Read the guide →
Reptiles LC Tuatara Sphenodon punctatus The tuatara of New Zealand looks like a lizard but is the last survivor of an order of reptiles older than the dinosaurs. It has a working third eye, keeps growing for decades, and may live past 100. Read the guide →
Mammals VU Walrus Odobenus rosmarus The walrus uses its metre-long tusks to haul onto ice and its 700 whiskers to find clams on the dark seabed. Learn how this Arctic giant feeds, why it turns pink, and how ice loss threatens it. Read the guide →
Birds VU Wandering Albatross Diomedea exulans The wandering albatross has the longest wingspan of any living bird and can glide for days without flapping, circling the globe on the wind. Learn how it flies so efficiently and why it is Vulnerable. Read the guide →
Fish LC Wels Catfish Silurus glanis The wels catfish is Europe's largest freshwater fish — a 2-to-3-metre, whiskered ambush predator that hunts by smell and electric sense in the dark, and in France it hunts pigeons on land. Read the guide →
Birds LC Bald Eagle Haliaeetus leucocephalus The bald eagle is a fish-hunting sea eagle and a rare conservation success — back from near-extinction in the US. Learn about its huge nests, its eyesight, and why it isn't actually bald. Read the guide →
Mammals LC Bottlenose Dolphin Tursiops truncatus The bottlenose dolphin hunts with sound, calls other dolphins by name, and uses tools. Learn how echolocation works, why pods cooperate, and what threatens this widespread ocean mammal. Read the guide →
Mammals LC Brown Bear Ursus arctos The brown bear is the most widespread bear on Earth, from Spain to Alaska, and includes the grizzly and the giant Kodiak. Learn how it hibernates, what it eats, and how a cub is born mid-sleep. Read the guide →
Invertebrates LC Common Octopus Octopus vulgaris The common octopus has three hearts, blue blood, and two-thirds of its neurons in its arms. Learn how it changes colour in a heartbeat, solves puzzles, and lives just one to two years. Read the guide →
Reptiles EN Green Sea Turtle Chelonia mydas The green sea turtle is the only sea turtle that grazes seagrass as an adult, migrates thousands of kilometres, and returns to its birth beach to nest. Learn how it lives and why it's Endangered. Read the guide →
Mammals DD Orca Orcinus orca The orca is the ocean's top predator — a giant dolphin that hunts in coordinated family pods and even kills great white sharks. Learn how orca culture works and why some populations are collapsing. Read the guide →
Mammals VU Polar Bear Ursus maritimus The polar bear is the largest land carnivore and a marine mammal that hunts seals from sea ice. Learn how it stays warm, why it needs the ice, and how warming threatens it. Read the guide →
Reptiles LC Saltwater Crocodile Crocodylus porosus The saltwater crocodile is the largest living reptile and has the strongest bite ever measured. Learn how it ambushes prey, crosses open ocean, and how it recovered from near-extinction. Read the guide →
Birds VU Snowy Owl Bubo scandiacus The snowy owl is a heavy, day-hunting owl of the Arctic tundra that lives and breeds on lemmings. Learn how it survives the cold, why some years it flies far south, and why numbers are falling. Read the guide →
Fish EN Whale Shark Rhincodon typus The whale shark is the largest fish in the sea — a 12-metre, spotted filter feeder that strains plankton and is completely harmless to people. Learn how it feeds, breeds, and why it's Endangered. Read the guide →
Birds NT Emperor Penguin Aptenodytes forsteri The emperor penguin breeds through the Antarctic winter, the harshest conditions any bird faces. Learn how males incubate eggs at −40 °C and why sea ice loss threatens the species. Read the guide →
Fish VU Great White Shark Carcharodon carcharias The great white is the largest predatory fish alive. Learn how it senses prey, why it breaches, how slowly it reproduces, and what its Vulnerable status really means. Read the guide →