The eastern spot-billed duck is migratory, wintering in Southeast Asia. It is quite gregarious outside the breeding season and forms small flocks. The populations in Japan and the Russian Far East have expanded their range northwards by more than 500 km since the early 20th century, possibly in reaction to global warming.
It is a bird of freshwater lakes and marshes in fairly open country and feeds by dabbling for plant food mainly in the evening or at night. The breeding season varies with rainfall and water condition but normally between April and July. It nests on the ground in vegetation near water. The clutch is usually 7-9 eggs. Incubation begins after the last egg is laid (allowing the chicks to hatch simultaneously) and the young hatch after about 24 days. The chicks are black with a yellow back and resemble those of mallards but with a wider eyestripe.
Both the male and female have calls similar to the mallard, with females producing a loud quack, and males a deeper, quieter sound.


The adult Anasa tristis is a greyish-brown, somewhat flattened insect reaching a length of about 1.5 cm (0.6 in) and a width of 0.75 cm (0.3 in). There is often a row of alternate brown and gold spots along the margin of the abdomen. Adults survive for three or four months.


The usual foraging habitats are inland wetlands and are only rarely seen along river banks and tidal flats. On agricultural landscapes, birds forage in crop fields, irrigation canals, and in seasonal marshes. Birds may move widely in response to habitat conditions. Young birds also disperse widely after fledging. Individuals ringed at Bharatpur in India have been recovered 800 km east and a bird ringed in Thailand has been recovered 1500 km west in Bangladesh. Storks are regularly disoriented by lighthouses along the southeast coast of India on overcast nights between August and September. The species is very rare in the Sind and Punjab regions of Pakistan, but widespread and common in India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand and Cambodia. It has recently expanded its range into southwestern China.


During the warmer part of the day, Asian openbills soar on thermals and have a habit of descending rapidly into their feeding areas. Groups may forage together in close proximity in shallow water or marshy ground on which they may walk with a slow and steady gait. The Asian openbill feeds mainly on large molluscs, especially Pila species, and they separate the shell from the body of the snail using the tip of the beak. The tip of the lower mandible of the beak is often twisted to the right. This tip is inserted into the opening of the snail and the body is extracted with the bill still under water. Jerdon noted that they were able to capture snails even when blindfolded. The exact action being difficult to see, led to considerable speculation on the method used. Sir Julian Huxley examined the evidence from specimens and literature and came to the conclusion that the bill gap was used like a nutcracker. He held the rough edges of the bill as being the result of wear and tear from such actions. Subsequent studies have dismissed this idea and the rough edge of the bill has been suggested as being an adaptation to help handle hard and slippery shells. They forage for prey by holding their bill tips slightly apart and make rapid vertical jabs in shallow water often with the head and neck partially submerged. The gap in the bill is not used for handling snail shells and forms only with age. Young birds that lack a gap are still able to forage on snails. It has been suggested that the gap allows the tips to strike at a greater angle to increases the force that the tips can apply on snail shells. Smaller snails are often swallowed whole or crushed.  They also feed on water snakes, frogs and large insects. When foraging on agricultural landscapes with a variety of habitats, Asian openbills preferentially use natural marshes and lakes (especially in the monsoon and winter), and irrigation canals (especially in the summer) as foraging habitat.


The breeding season is after the rains, during July to September in northern India and Nepal, and November to March in southern India and Sri Lanka. They may skip breeding in drought years. The Asian openbill breeds colonially, building a rough platform of sticks often on half-submerged trees (often Barringtonia, Avicennia and Acacia species), typically laying two to four eggs. The nesting trees are either shared with those of egrets, cormorants and darters, or can be single-species colonies like in lowland Nepal. Nesting colonies are sometimes in highly disturbed areas such as inside villages and on trees located in crop fields. In lowland Nepal, 13 colonies found in an agricultural landscape had an average colony size of 52, ranging from 5 nests to 130 nests. The majority of these colonies were located on Bombax ceiba trees, with much fewer located on Ficus religiosa and Dalbergia sissoo tree species. Asian openbills preferred trees that were much taller and bigger than trees that were available on the landscape, and selectively used wild and native tree species entirely avoiding species that were important for resources such as fruits (e.g. Mangifera indica) despite such trees being much more common. Religious beliefs have secured important trees such as Ficus species, and agro-forestry has secured the most preferred species, Bombax ceiba, that Asian openbills prefer to locate colonies in lowland Nepal. The nests are close to each other leading to considerable aggressive interactions between birds on neighbouring nests. Both parents take turns in incubation, the eggs hatching after about 25 days. The chicks emerge with cream coloured down and are shaded by the loosely outspread and drooped wings of a parent.
Initiation of nests in lowland Nepal was highly synchronized, with colonies started during July and August. Breeding success at nests in these colonies was impacted by proximity of colonies to human habitation, and the progression of the breeding season. Colonies closer to human habitation had lower success, and colonies initiated later during the breeding season (when flooding of the rice fields had reduced to allow ripening of the crop) had lower success. Number of chicks that fledged from colonies located on trees in agricultural landscapes in lowland Nepal were similar to that observed in a protected, mangrove reserve in eastern India suggesting that agricultural areas are not always detrimental to large waterbirds such as Asian openbills.
Nesting openbills in Nepal took an average of 27 minutes to return to nests with food for nestlings and fledglings. The time taken to find food was most impacted by the location of wetlands around colonies, and the progression of the breeding season. Adults look the least time to return with food earlier in the season when the dominant rice crop was most flooded, and time increased as the rice ripened along with the drying out of the fields.
Like other storks, they are silent except for clattering produced by the striking of the male's bill against that of the female during copulation. They also produce low honking notes accompanied by up and down movements of the bill when greeting a partner arriving at the nest. Males may sometimes form polygynous associations, typically with two females which may lay their eggs in the same nest.


Young birds at the nest are sometimes preyed on by imperial, steppe and greater spotted eagles. Chaunocephalus ferox, an intestinal parasite, is a trematode worm found in about 80% of the wild populations in Thailand while another species Echinoparyphium oscitansi has been described from Asian openbills in Thailand. Other helminth parasites such as Thapariella anastomusa, T. oesophagiala and  T. udaipurensis have been described from the oesophagus of storks.
In colonial India, sportsmen shot the openbill for meat, calling it the "beef-steak bird" (although this name was also used for the woolly-necked stork).


Anatrytone logan, the Delaware skipper, is a North American butterfly. It is a member of the subfamily Hesperiinae, the grass skippers. This skipper ranges from the southern Canadian Prairies and southern Ontario through the midwestern and eastern United States.


Both females and males are yellow orange with black borders and dark brown veins on their wings. The borders are broader on the front and back edges of the hindwing. "The underside is yellowish orange, lacking any markings except a narrow dark border on the forewing." The wingspan is 2.5 to 4.3 centimeters.


This species lives in many types of moist habitat, such as marshes and residential landscaping. It is active most of the year, producing multiple broods from February to October in warmer regions, and generally a single brood during the summer in northern areas.
Adults feed on the nectar of flowers, especially pink and white taxa such as milkweeds, mountain mints, and thistles. The caterpillars feed on grasses such as big bluestem and switchgrass.


They frequently fly high up into the sky in search of prey, which includes butterflies, other Odonata and tadpoles; small prey is eaten while flying. They breed in a variety of aquatic habitats from large ponds to dikes, but they require a plentiful supply of vegetation in the water. The females lay the eggs into plants such as pondweed, and always lay alone. The larvae are very aggressive and are likely to influence the native species composition of colonized freshwater ecosystems. The adult male is highly territorial, and difficult to approach. In the summer months emperor dragonflies are frequent visitors to gardens, being especially prevalent in the southern counties of Great Britain.


Common Green Darners are large dragonflies, ranging from 6.8 to 8 cm (2.7 – 3.1 inches) in length and a wingspan of up to 10 cm (3.9 inches). Both sexes have an unmarked green thorax. Mature males have bluish-purple abdomens (the first few abdominal segments are the brightest) with a black dorsal stripe that broadens near the end of the abdomen. Immature males and most females have reddish-brown abdomens, but some females are patterned like adult males. Wings are initially clear but usually become amber-tinted with age, especially in females. Both sexes have a black ‘bulls-eye’ mark on the face (more precisely, the frons) in front of their eyes, a distinguishing field mark that separates them from the superficially similar Comet Darner (Anax longipes). This species oviposits in tandem which is a unique behavior among North American darners.


Both the adult and the nymphal stage are predators. Nymphs prey upon immature aquatic insects (including conspecifics), small crustaceans, small tadpoles, and even small fish. Adults primarily prey on winged insects, including wasps, flies, butterflies, and other Odonates. The primary predators of Common Green Darner nymphs are fish. Adults are preyed upon by birds and occasionally robber flies, spiders, and other large dragonflies.


Comet darners are found in shallow lakes and ponds which tend to have extensive beds and grasses and lack fish. They are found along the eastern United States from Missouri, Michigan, New England and some even further north.


It is a crepuscular dragonfly, active in the dusk. This species can be easily distinguished by the multicolored upper surface of frons and by the shape and relative lengths of the anal appendages. Its labium and labrum are golden-yellow and face and frons are greenish yellow and eyes are green, bluish when aged. Its thorax is pale olivaceous brown with dark brown sutures. Its segment two of the abdomen is turquoise blue. Segment three has a large blue patch at each side. Segments 4 to 9 have an irregular black middorsal stripe. Segment 10 is black.


The eastern American toad (A. a. americanus) is a medium-sized toad usually ranging in size from 5–9 cm (2.0–3.5 in); record 11.1 cm (4.4 in). The color and pattern is somewhat variable, especially for the females. Skin color can change depending on habitat colors, humidity, stress, and temperature. Color changes range from yellow to brown to black, from solid colors to speckled. Their breeding habits are very similar to Anaxyrus fowleri. The call or voice of a breeding male is a high trill, lasting 6–30 seconds, similar to a ringing telephone. They hibernate during the winter. The eastern American toad has spots that contain only one to two warts. It also has enlarged warts on the tibia or lower leg below the knee. While the belly is usually spotted, in some areas many are, and it is generally more so on the forward half (in some rare individuals there may be few or no spots). This subspecies of the American toad has no or very little markings on it. The spades on the back legs are blackish. Some toads of this subspecies have a more pervasive red and deep brown color, many with red warts on their bodies. Also eastern American toads have parotoid glands that are the same color as the surrounding skin. The glands don't usually have any patterning on them.
Other species that may be confused with the eastern American toad are Fowler's toad, which has three or more warts in the largest dark spots, and in the far west of its range woodhouse's toad. Fowler's toad can be especially difficult to identify in comparison to the eastern American toad but one difference is that it never has a spotted belly and both cranial crests touch the parotoid glands. Also, Fowler's toads are very fast hoppers (bursts of 5–10 fast hops) in comparison to Eastern toads lethargic, casual hopping and walking locomotion. In the eastern American toad these crests almost never touch the parotoid glands, which secrete bufotoxin, a poisonous substance meant to make the toad unpalatable to potential predators. Bufotoxin is a mild poison in comparison to that of other poisonous toads and frogs, but it can irritate human eyes and mucous membranes and is dangerous to smaller animals (such as dogs) when ingested.
American toads require a semi-permanent freshwater pond or pool with shallow water in which to breed, to gather their water supplies in times of drought or as a routine, and for their early development. They also require dense patches of vegetation, for cover and hunting grounds. Given these two things and a supply of insects for food, American toads can live almost everywhere, ranging from forests to flat grassland. Females when caught are silent and easily tamed, adapting to terrarium life readily, while the smaller males are readily communicative. The smaller males do not adapt well to terrarium life and should be released after a few days of observation. Adult toads are mostly nocturnal, although juveniles are often abroad by day. When it rains, these toads will become active and can be observed eating robustly worms and insects leaving their burrows and walking in front of an opportunist toad. These toads are 'creatures of habit' once they have a certain area they prefer to live within... an acre of wooded forest with water in proximity for soaking, a home with cool ledges and window wells; they commonly seek cover in burrows, under boardwalks, flat stones, boards, logs, wood piles, or other cover. When cold weather comes, these toads dig backwards and bury themselves in the dirt of their summer homes, or they may choose another site in which to hibernate. Their diet includes crickets, mealworms, earthworms, ants, spiders, slugs, centipedes, moths, and other small invertebrates. Some of these toads have been known to live over 30 years and currently a female specimen (over 13 centimeters long) is living healthily into her late 30s. Another female toad of 17 centimeters is known to have existed in Wisconsin from Washington Island on Lake Michigan.
The eastern American toad may be confused with the Canadian toad in the area where they overlap, but the cranial crests in the American toad do not join to form a raised "boss" (bump) like they do in the Canadian toad. Its range also overlaps with the southern toad's, but in this species the cranial crests form two unique knobs.


Western toads are active from January to October, depending on latitude and elevation, and hibernate over the winter. Boreal toads in one Colorado population used natural chambers near a small stream bed. The high water table, constantly flowing stream, and deep winter snow served to maintain the air temperature within the hibernaculum at a point slightly above freezing. Emergence from hibernation followed a few days of warm temperatures that freed the entrance and increased temperatures within the chamber to about 39.2 °F (4.0 °C).
At low elevations western toads are active at night; at high elevations and in the northern parts of their range they are diurnal. Body temperature of western toads is closely correlated with the substrate temperature. Basking and conduction from the substrate are primary means of increasing body temperature and cooling is achieved by evaporative cooling and conduction of heat to a cooler medium. Diurnal and nocturnal activity are often related to seasonal changes in temperature; most western toads are diurnal during the spring and fall but are nocturnal during the warmer summer months.
In central Oregon, the minimum breeding age for male western toads is three years, and probably four or five years for females. California toads are reported as sexually mature at 2 years of age. Male western toads breed every year; females breed at less regular intervals, depending on individual condition and previous years' breeding effort. Sex ratios differ according to habitat type; males are more numerous in wet areas and females are more numerous in dry habitats.
Eggs are laid in open water from February to July, with peak activity occurring in April. Timing of egg-laying activity varies with elevation and weather conditions. In Colorado, initiation of breeding was correlated with the onset of warming weather and initiation of snowpack melting. Eggs are usually laid in late May or early June. In western Montana, a few males were present on the shores (of two gravel pits) by May 11, 1967, and by May 14, each pond contained at least 30 males. Males were spaced at least 1 foot (0.30 m) apart, all facing the shore Eggs are laid in gelatinous strings of 13 to 52 eggs per inch (2.5 cm), in masses of up to 16,500 per clutch. Egg development rate is partially dependent on temperature; hatching times vary.
Metamorphosis is usually completed within three months of egg laying. The time required for metamorphosis is given as 30 to 45 days for the boreal toad and 28 to 45 days for the California toad.
Female western toads at least 10 to 11 years of age have been reported. In Colorado, boreal toads probably attain a maximum age of at least 9 years.


Western toads are widespread throughout the mountainous areas of northwestern North America, ranging from sea level to elevations near or above regional treeline, or 10,000 feet (305–3,050 m) in elevation. It is uncommon at the higher elevations. Elevational range in Colorado is from about 7,000 to 11,860 feet (2,130 to 3,610 m). In the mountains of Colorado, the largest western toad populations usually occur from about 9,500 to 11,000 feet (2,900 to 3,400 m) elevation. Western toads occupy desert streams and springs, grasslands, and mountain meadows; they are less common in heavily wooded regions. They are usually found in or near ponds, lakes (including saline lakes), reservoirs, rivers, and streams within the above-mentioned habitats. Under laboratory conditions western toads were able to survive in 40% seawater, but died within a week when exposed to 50% seawater.
In Colorado, individual western toads typically maintain distinct ranges which vary greatly in size according to the condition of the habitat. Breeding males may exhibit territoriality, especially in areas where breeding sites are scarce.
Populations of western toads have very limited dispersal, particularly in rugged terrain.
Western toads require open water for breeding. All breeding members of a local population tend to lay their eggs in the same location, which is used repeatedly from year to year. For example, at one site on a permanent lake in the Oregon Cascade Range, western toads returned each year to the same submerged willow clumps. Eggs are usually laid in shallow water, not deeper than 12 inches (300 mm) but usually at least 6 inches (150 mm). The warmth of shallow water increases the rate at which development occurs; shallow water and vegetative matter may contribute to protection of eggs from predation by fish. In western Montana, breeding western toads used gravel pits that were only filled with water during spring runoff. These gravel pits contained cattails (Typha spp.) but no other vegetation, and were 5 feet (1.5 m) deep in the center.


Western toads are terrestrial. Their body temperatures are largely controlled by basking and evaporative cooling. In order to avoid evaporative conditions, they usually spend the daylight hours on the forest floor in the soil under rocks, logs, stumps, or other surface objects or in rodent burrows. Individuals have been observed to use the same retreat repeatedly. In locations where there
is little or no hiding cover, western toads may spend most of the day in the water. Under more humid conditions, western toads may become active during the day.
Western toads lay their eggs in water; they require some form of surface cover near the egg-laying location. Woody debris or submerged vegetation is used to protect egg masses.


Western toads wait for their prey on the surface of the ground or in shallow burrows dug by other animals. Their diet consists largely of bees, beetles, ants, and arachnids. Other foods include crayfish, sow bugs, grasshoppers, trichopterans, lepidopterans, and dipterans.


It is a small toad species growing to 3.7 to 7.5 cm (1.5 to 3.0 in) in length. It has a flattened head and body, and a light grey, olive or reddish brown dorsum with reddish or orange skin glands. It has a whitish or buff venter with or without faint dark spotting, and round parotoid glands. The snout is pointed. The juvenile toad looks similar to the adult, but has more prominent ventral spotting and the undersides of its feet are yellow. The male red-spotted toad has a dusky throat and develops nuptial pads during the breeding season.
It may hybridize with the western toad (Anaxyrus boreas) in some locations, possibly with other toad species too. It is docile and easily handled with little or no skin gland secretions.


The Texas toad is native to the United States where it is found in the state of Texas (in 2009 it was designated as the Texas State Amphibian), its range also extends northward to Oklahoma, westward to New Mexico and southward to northern Mexico. It is a desert species and is found in dry grassland, savannahs with scattered mesquite and open woodland, usually on sandy or frequently inundated soils.


The Texas toad feeds on insects such as beetles, ants and bugs. It digs a burrow in soft soil and can bury itself in mud. It sometimes conceals itself in a gopher burrow, under a log or in a deep crack in the mud to prevent desiccation, spending much of its time dormant in prolonged dry weather.
Breeding occurs after heavy rains when male frogs congregate at temporary pools, ditches, cattle tanks and other wet places and call continuously, especially at night. The call is described as being a "series of explosive trills", each lasting for about one and a half seconds with intervals of one second. The females seem to be attracted to the largest males with the loudest calls. The eggs are laid in the water, often entangled in submerged vegetation. They hatch in two days and the tadpoles feed on algae growing on underwater plants. They may retreat to deeper water when disturbed. They spend between eighteen and sixty days as tadpoles depending on circumstances such as water temperature, after which time they undergo metamorphosis and leave the water as juvenile toads.
Other toads using the same water bodies for breeding include the Gulf Coast toad (Incilius nebulifer), the green toad (Anaxyrus debilis), the Great Plains narrow-mouthed toad (Gastrophryne olivacea) and Couch's spadefoot toad (Scaphiopus couchii). The Texas toad sometimes hybridizes with Woodhouse's toad (Anaxyrus woodhousii) or the Great Plains toad (Anaxyrus cognatus).


The southern toad (Anaxyrus terrestris) is a true toad native to the southeastern United States, from eastern Louisiana and southeastern Virginia south to Florida. It often lives in areas with sandy soils. It is nocturnal and spends the day in a burrow. Its coloring is usually brown but can be red, gray, or black. It is approximately 8 cm (3 inches) long.


The southern toad is a medium-sized, plump species with a snout-to-vent length of up to 92 mm (3.6 in) with females being slightly larger than males. The most obvious distinguishing feature is the knobs on the head and the backward-pointing spurs that extends as far as the paratoid glands. The dorsal surface is covered with warts, some of which may be spiny. The color of the head, back and sides varies from brick red to mottled grey, brown and black while the underparts are pale, sometimes with dark spots on the chest.


The southern toad is found on the coastal plain of the southeastern United States. Its range extends from southern Virginia to Florida and Louisiana and there are two isolated populations on the  Piedmont plateau and the Blue Ridge Mountains in South Carolina. It can also be found in some parts of southern Nigeria, specifically Cross River State and Ebonyi state in Nigeria.


The southern toad is nocturnal and lives in a burrow by day, or sometimes hides under a log or pile of debris. It occurs in woodland in cultivated land and gardens and sometimes stands beneath outdoor lights at night to pick up the attracted insects that fall to the ground. A 2006 study found that there was no difference in the number of toads found in wooded and clearcut area, but there was a difference in the survival rates which was much higher in wooded area.  In winter it may become inactive and remain in its burrow for extended periods. Some do not appear to be threatened by humans whilst others are
Breeding starts in spring when the males migrate from their upland habitats to the lowland pools, ditches,  swamps and the margins of lakes where they breed. The breeding season typically occurs between the first of March into late May although it will occasionally continue up until September. Heavy rain triggers large numbers of males to congregate and call, forming choruses. Each female lays a clutch of up to 4,000 eggs and the water may be thick with spawn. The eggs hatch and the tadpoles take 30 to 55 days to develop before undergoing metamorphosis into juvenile toads about 1 cm (0.4 in) long. The tadpoles feed on algae which they scrape from underwater vegetation. Adults are carnivorous and feed on any small invertebrates they can find.


The adult wasps are small, stout and brown, about 5 mm long with clear wings nearly twice the length of the body. The antennae are filiform and about the same length as the legs. Despite their size they are one of the largest species of cynipid wasps.
The gall itself is a typical oak apple gall in appearance, roughly spherical and varies from greenish to reddish or orange depending on host, age and environmental conditions. The galls range in size from a 2–14 cm across and often contain multiple larvae as well as parasites and other species that form a mutual relationship by feeding off the galls themselves. The outer galls are hard in texture and are not easy to penetrate.


Andricus quercuscalifornicus is believed to reproduce strictly by parthenogenesis, and no male specimens have ever been recovered. According to phylogenetic studies, several species of the genus Andricus have cryptic sexual generations.  The adult female lays eggs in the cambium layer of oak twigs during the fall using her ovipositor. More vigorous twigs will have more galls. The eggs overwinter on the twig, and then hatch in the spring, usually in early April. The resulting larvae induce galls immediately, where they can seem to balloon almost overnight onto the tree. This is the point where most of the parasitoids enter the gall, while it is still soft and small enough for their ovipositor to reach the larvae. After anywhere from a few weeks to two months, the gall stops growing and begins to desiccate, turning tan or brown. The larvae pupate and then bore their way out of the gall in late summer or early fall and fly off to lay eggs in other trees. A few larvae overwinter inside the gall and don't emerge until the following fall. The reason for this is unknown.
These wasps form an important role in the ecosystem, with more than 20 known species that are parasitoids, inquilines, and hyperparasites that live on its life cycle, while the galls form a persistent shelter for various forms of fungi as well as many other insects. Several birds are also known to feed from the galls and their inhabitants.


It is a small shrub growing to 10–20 cm (4–8 in) (rarely to 40 cm or 16 in) tall with slender stems. The leaves are evergreen, alternately arranged, lanceolate, 1–5 cm (1⁄2–2 in) long and 2–8 mm (0.08–0.31 in) broad, dark green above (purplish in winter) and white beneath with the leaf margins curled under. The flowers are bell-shaped, white to pink, 5–8 mm (0.20–0.31 in) long; flowering is in late spring to early summer. The fruit is a small capsule containing numerous seeds.
There are two varieties, treated as distinct species by some botanists:
Andromeda polifolia var. polifolia. Northern Europe and Asia, northwestern North America.
Andromeda polifolia var. latifolia Aiton [1789]. Northeastern North America (syn. A. glaucophylla Link [1821], A. polifolia var. glaucophylla (Link) DC. [1839]).


The sombre greenbul (Andropadus importunus) is a member of the bulbul family of passerine birds. It is a resident breeder in coastal bush, evergreen forest and dry shrub land in eastern and southern Africa.  It is the only member of the genus Andropadus.


This plant does best in moist soils, and is found naturally in areas such as swamps, wet savannas, pine flatwoods, bogs, and fens. It prefers full sun, and is best suited to USDA hardiness zones 5–9.


It is cultivated as an ornamental grass. This species also has potential as a noxious weed and is easily spread via seed contamination. It is a pest plant in Hawaii, where it has been documented on the island of Kaua‘i. It has been declared a weed in Puerto Rico and a potentially invasive weed in Mexico.
The seeds are eaten by songbirds and small mammals, while the larvae of certain butterflies feed on the plant.


Andropogon virginicus is a species of grass known by several common names, including broomsedge bluestem, yellowsedge bluestem and (in Australia, because it was introduced to that country after being used as packaging for bottles of American whiskey) whiskey grass. It is native to the southeastern United States and as far north as the Great Lakes. It is known as an introduced species in California and Hawaii, where it is weedy.


Andropogon virginicus is a perennial grass forming narrow clumps of stems up to just over a meter in maximum height [approx. 3 feet 3 inches]. Its stems and leaves are green when new, turning purplish to orange and then straw-colored with age. It produces large amounts of seeds small enough to disperse on the wind. This grass is successful in a wide range of habitats. It is a prolific seed producer, it has a high germination rate and seedling survival rate, and it thrives in poor soils.


It is a small plant with a rosette of leaves and umbels of small white flowers held on multiple stems. It is parasitized by the oomycete species Peronospora agrorum.
Androsace septentrionalis subsp. subumbellata is a small plant with naked stems arising from a basal rosette of simple leaves.  The leaves are toothed and the stems terminate in an umbel of flowers. The very small flowers are five-cleft, and the sepals are persistent. The involucre bracts are linear. This subspecies is listed as threatened in Minnesota, where it has been recorded growing in sandy, xeric habitats, around ancient beach ridges and sand prairies.


The green salamander (Aneides aeneus) is a species of lungless salamander in the family Plethodontidae. It and the Hickory Nut Gorge green salamander (A. caryaensis) are the only currently-described members of the genus Aneides that inhabit any areas in the eastern half of United States (all other Aneides salamanders are found west of the Mississippi River). Rarely seen in the field, the green salamander is an extremely habitat-specific species that is seldom found away from its preferred surroundings: moist, shaded rock crevices.


Aneides aeneus is known to inhabit both the Alleghenies and Cumberland Plateau, reaching from southwestern Pennsylvania to northern Alabama and northeastern Mississippi. It is also commonly found in South-Central Ohio. Isolated populations are known at the Blue Ridge Escarpment at the junction of Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina. The range of the Alleghenies and Cumberland Plateau extends southwest from Fayette County, Pennsylvania through eastern West Virginia, eastern Kentucky, the extreme western portions of Virginia, Tennessee, and Alabama. The population discovered in 1930 in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park has not been located since. There may be disjunct populations on Clinch Mountain, on Bays Mountain and the Appalachian Ridge and Valley, and in the Inner Central Basin of Tennessee (Redmond and Scott, 1996).


The arboreal salamander (Aneides lugubris) is a species of climbing salamander. An insectivore, it is native to California and Baja California, where it is primarily associated with oak and sycamore woodlands, and thick chaparral.


Aneides lugubris is 6.5–10 cm (2.6–3.9 in) SVL (snout-vent length), with plain purplish-brown coloring, usually spotted dorsally with gold or yellow, although it may also be unspotted. The tail is prehensile. The juvenile is dark overall, clouded with greyish color and fine yellow speckling on the back. The male of this species can be distinguished by its broad triangular head, with the front teeth of the jaw extending beyond the bottom lip.
This species is an excellent climber and difficult to capture. It is nocturnal, spending daylight hours and dry periods in the cavities of oak trees, often with many other individuals of its species. A large adult can inflict a painful bite. Arboreal Salamanders hatch from eggs laid and guarded in burrows. Hatchling size is 24 mm SVL, age at maturity is 2.69 yr, and average adult age is 8–11 yr. Annual survival probability increases with age from 0.363 in age 0 to 0.783 in ages >4 yr.
Because they are plethodontid (plethodontidae) salamanders they are lungless and breathe through their skin.  They can produce sounds which have been compared to a faintly barking dog.


Anemone berlandieri is native to much of the Southern United States, from Texas to Florida. It ranges as far north as Kansas, and as far south as northeast Mexico. There is also an isolated population in the southern Appalachian Mountains. It grows in sunny open areas, such as prairies and hillsides, and in wooded areas over a thin shale substrate.


Mediterranean littoral, from Greece, Albania, southern Turkey and Syria to the Sinai Peninsula with sporadic extension east to Iran and west along the Mediterranean shores of Italy, southern France and North Africa.


In the wild, A. coronaria is winter flowering and cross pollinated by bees, flies and beetles, which can carry pollen over long distances.


Anemone coronaria was introduced into England prior to 1596, being described in Thomas Johnson's edition of John Gerard's Herball, first published in 1597 and was popular during the time of Queen Elizabeth I. By the beginning of the eighteenth century, breeders in France and Italy had already considerably improved the range of colours available.
Anemone coronaria is widely grown for its decorative flowers, and has a hardiness of USDA zones 7–10, preferring full sun to part shade. Although perennial in its native climate, A. coronaria is usually grown as an annual in cooler climates, from tubers. Planting is usually in the autumn if kept in pots in a greenhouse through the winter or in the ground in spring once the risk of frost has passed.


Anemone hortensis reaches on average 20–40 centimetres (7.9–15.7 in) of height. The stem is erect and pubescent. The basal leaves have a petiole  5–10 centimetres (2.0–3.9 in) long and are palmate or “hand-shaped”, with 3-5 toothed lobes. The solitary flowers are fragrant and range in color from white-bluish or mauve to red-purple, with a diameter of 3–6 centimetres (1.2–2.4 in). They have 12-20 lanceolate and acute petals, with numerous bluish or violet stamens and blue anthers. The flowering period extends from March through May. This plant is pollinated by wind or dispersed by animals.


Anemone multifida is found growing on calcareous ledges, in areas with rocky or gravelly soils around lakes and other water ways, and on dunes. In Minnesota it is record as growing in a prairie.
It is typically found growing in subarctic and boreal areas in western and central North America but some populations are also found in mountainous and temperate habitats in the southern parts of its North American range. It is also found around the Great lakes region and there are rare occurrences in the north eastern US states and eastern Canada.
A. multifada is poisonous as it has high ranunculin content: about 8.1% in aerial parts and 4% in root per dry weight.


Anemone virginiana is an upright growing herbaceous species of flowering plant buttercup family Ranunculaceae. It is a perennial that grows 30–80 centimetres (12–31 in)  tall, flowering from May until July, the flowers are white or greenish-white. After flowering the fruits are produced in a dense rounded thimble shaped spikes 15–35 millimetres (0.59–1.38 in) long and 12 millimetres (0.47 in) wide. When the fruits, called achenes, are ripe they have gray-white colored, densely woolly styles, that allow them to blow away in the wind. The leaf structure is whorled halfway up the stem and each individual leaf appears to be deeply cut. Native from eastern North America, where it is found growing in dry or open woods. This plant can be found in 38 out of the 50 states in the U.S. and is located anywhere from Maine to Minnesota going west, and found as far south as Georgia and Louisiana.
Common names include tall anemone, thimble-weed and tumble-weed.  Note that several other plant species are known as "thimbleweed".
Although this plant sometimes is called a "tumbleweed", it lacks the characteristic tumbleweed habit. The fruit resembles a tumbleweed in that it is wind-dispersed and tumbles, an unusual mechanism of seed dispersal (see Diaspore (botany)).
Anemone virginiana was also given the common name "Thimbleweed" due to its pistil resembling the shape of a thimble. This plant is very durable in different weather conditions, ranging from part shade to sun and being drought and cold tolerant. It prefers acidic soils but will tolerate liming, making it great for gardens.


Anemonoides quinquefolia is native to North America. It ranges from Manitoba across the Great Lakes region to Nova Scotia, south along the Appalachian Mountains to central Alabama. Further west there are isolated populations in Alberta, North Dakota, and Missouri. It prefers moist open woods, thickets, and clearings. It is also found along streams and occasionally in swampy areas.


In her book on herbs of the southwestern USA, Dr. Soule discusses the common name.  "Yerba mansa is one of those names which confounds linguists.  Yerba is Spanish for herb, and thus one would think that mansa is also from Spanish as well, but all indications point to the fact that it is not.  Mansa means tame, peaceful, calm in Spanish, and the plant has no sedative effect, nor did local people ever use it as a calming agent.  Its primary use is as an antimicrobial, antibacterial, and antifungal.  The most likely explanation is that mansa is a Spanish alteration of the original native word for the plant, now lost in the depths of time." Hartweg, who collected it at León, Guanajuato in 1837, recorded the local name as yerba del manso. It is also known as yerba del manso in northern Baja California. The word "manso" could be short for "remanso" (backwater) which would agree with the areas where the plant thrives.


Angelica archangelica, commonly known as garden angelica, wild celery, and Norwegian angelica, is a biennial plant from the family Apiaceae, a subspecies of which is cultivated for its sweetly scented edible stems and roots. Like several other species in Apiaceae, its appearance is similar to several poisonous species (Conium, Heracleum, and others), and should not be consumed unless it has been identified with absolute certainty. Synonyms include Archangelica officinalis Hoffm. and Angelica officinalis Moench.


Angelica atropurpurea, known commonly as purplestem angelica, great angelica, American angelica, high angelica, and masterwort, is a species of flowering plant that can be found in moist and swampy woodlands, mostly by riverbanks, in eastern North America. It has been found in eastern Canada (Nunavut, Ontario, Quebec, Labrador, Newfoundland, all 3 Maritime Provinces) and the United States (from New England south as far as North Carolina, and west to Minnesota, Iowa, and Tennessee).
The plant grows to 6 ft (180 cm) tall. The erect, branching stem is purple, smooth, hollow, and sturdy. The leaves are divided into segments. The total width of a lower leaf may be up to 2 ft (61 cm). The plant has white to greenish flowers in umbrella-like umbels. One umbel may have as many as 40 branches and be up to 8 in (20 cm) across. The stalks can be eaten like celery and the flavor is similar. Early American settlers boiled parts of the plant to make into candy and added it to cakes. In Europe, it was believed that the plant could cure alcoholism.
The aromatic root of angelica has widespread use as a purification herb among the Native American cultures. In California, it is often burned during a shaman's prayers in a healing ceremony. It has traditionally been held in high esteem by native peoples in Arkansas, who have often carried it in their medicine bags and mixed it with tobacco for smoking. In the Mvskoke Creek tribes of Alabama, Oklahoma, and Northwest Florida, Angelica atropurpurea (known as notossv in the Creek language) has both medicinal and ceremonial uses. Medicinally, notossv is used by the Creeks to: cure back pain in adults; to calm panic attacks or people that are in hysterics; as a vermifuge in children; as well as treating stomach disorders. Mvskoke Creek Ceremonial uses include preventing heat stroke during the Ribbon Dance in the Green Corn Ceremony, aiding ceremonial singers, and to help those in legal trouble.


The American eel (Anguilla rostrata) is a facultative catadromous fish found on the eastern coast of North America. Freshwater eels are fish belonging to the elopomorph superorder, a group of phylogenetically ancient teleosts. The American eel has a slender, snake-like body that is covered with a mucus layer, which makes the eel appear to be naked and slimy despite the presence of minute scales. A long dorsal fin runs from the middle of the back and is continuous with a similar ventral fin. Pelvic fins are absent, and relatively small pectoral fins can be found near the midline, followed by the head and gill covers. Variations exist in coloration, from olive green, brown shading to greenish-yellow and light gray or white on the belly. Eels from clear water are often lighter than those from dark, tannic acid streams.
The eel lives in fresh water and estuaries and only leaves these habitats to enter the Atlantic Ocean to make its spawning migration to the Sargasso Sea. Spawning takes place far offshore, where the eggs hatch. The female can lay up to 4 million buoyant eggs and dies after egg-laying. After the eggs hatch and the early-stage larvae develop into leptocephali, the young eels move toward North America, where they metamorphose into glass eels and enter freshwater systems where they grow as yellow eels until they begin to mature.
The American eel is found along the Atlantic coast including Chesapeake Bay and the Hudson River and as far north as the Saint Lawrence River region. It is also present in the river systems of the eastern Gulf of Mexico and in some areas further south. Like all anguillid eels, American eels hunt predominantly at night, and during the day they hide in mud, sand, or gravel very close to shore, at depths of roughly 5 to 6 feet. They feed on crustaceans, aquatic insects, small insects, and probably any aquatic organisms that they can find and eat.
American eels are economically important in various areas along the East Coast as bait for fishing for sport fishes such as the striped bass, or as a food fish in some areas. Their recruitment stages, the glass eels, are also caught and sold for use in aquaculture, although this is now restricted in most areas.
Eels were once an abundant species in rivers, and were an important fishery for aboriginal people. The construction of hydroelectric dams has blocked their migrations and locally extirpated eels in many watersheds. For example, in Canada, the vast numbers of eels in the St. Lawrence and Ottawa Rivers have dwindled.


American eels can grow to 1.22 m (4.0 ft) in length and to 7.5 kg (17 lb) in weight. Females are generally larger than males, lighter in color, with smaller eyes and higher fins. The body is elongate and snake-like. Its dorsal and anal fins are confluent with the rudimentary caudal fin. It lacks ventral fins but pectoral fins are present. The lateral line is well-developed and complete. The head is long and conical, with rather small, well-developed eyes. The mouth is terminal with jaws that are not particularly elongated. The teeth are small, pectinate or setiform in several series on the jaws and the vomer. Minute teeth also present on the pharyngeal bones, forming a patch on the upper pharyngeals. Tongue present with thick lips that are attached by a frenum in front. Nostrils are superior and well separated. Gill openings are partly below pectoral fins, relatively well-developed and well separated from one another. Inner gill slits are wide.
The scales are small, rudimentary, cycloid, relatively well embedded below the epidermis and therefore often difficult to see without magnification. The scales are not arranged in overlapping rows as they often are in other fish species but are rather irregular, in some places distributed like "parquet flooring". In general, one row of scales lies at right angle to the next, although the rows immediately above and below the lateral line lie at an angle of approximately 45°. Unlike other bony fishes, the first scales do not develop immediately after the larval stage but appear much later on.
Several morphological features distinguish the American eel from other eel species. Tesch (1977) described three morphological characteristics which persist through all stages from larvae to maturing eels: the total number of vertebrae (mean 107.2), the number of myomeres (mean 108.2), and the distance between the origin of the dorsal fin to the anus (mean 9.1% of total length).


The distribution of the American eel encompasses all accessible freshwater (streams and lakes), estuaries and coastal marine waters across a latitudinal range of 5 to 62 N. Their natural range includes the eastern North Atlantic Ocean coastline from Venezuela to Greenland and including Iceland. Inland, this species extends into the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River and its tributaries as far upstream as Minnesota and Wisconsin
Nonindigenous occurrences of this species in the United States were recorded from Lake Mead on the Colorado River and on the Arizona border. It was stocked on a few occasions in Sacramento and San Francisco bay, California, in the late 1800s. No apparent evidence of survival on these occasions was noted. It was also stocked and unintentionally introduced in various states, including Illinois, Indiana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania, . Stocking of this species also occurred in Utah in the late 1800s, but soon disappeared.


Eels are bottom dwellers. They hide in burrows, tubes, snags, masses of plants, other types of shelters. They are found in a variety of habitats including streams, rivers, and muddy or silt-bottomed lakes during their freshwater stage, as well as oceanic waters, coastal bays and estuaries. Individuals during the continental stage occasionally migrate between fresh, salt and brackish water habitats and have varying degrees of residence time in each. During winter, eels burrow under the mud and enter a state of torpor (or complete inactivity) at temperatures below 5 °C. although they may occasionally be active during this period. Temperature requirements are suggested to be flexible. It has been found that American eels during elver stage can survive temperature as low as −0.8 °C. Barila and Stauffer (1980) reported a final mean temperature preference at 16.7 °C. Karlsson et al. (1984) disagreed with this interpretation and found the final temperature preference of 17.4 ± 2.0 °C with a 95% confidence interval.
Seasonal patterns described by Fletcher and Anderson (1972) generalize annual movements from freshwater to estuaries and coastal bays to feed during spring, then either a return during the fall to overwinter (juvenile and immature adults), or a southward migration to the spawning grounds (silver eels Continental phase eels appear highly plastic in habitat use. Eels are extremely mobile and may access habitats that appear unavailable to them, using small watercourses or moving through wet grasses. Small eels (<100 mm total length) are able to climb and may succeed in passing over vertical barriers. Habitat availability may be reduced by factors such as habitat deterioration, barriers to upstream migration (larger eels), and barriers (i.e. turbines) to downstream migration that can result in mortality.


The American eel's complex life history begins far offshore in the Sargasso Sea in a semelparous and panmictic reproduction. In 1926 Marie Poland Fish described the collection of eggs that she observed hatch into eels, which she expanded in her taxonomic description of the larval egg development. From there, young eels drift with ocean currents and then migrate inland into streams, rivers and lakes. This journey may take many years to complete with some eels travelling as far as 6,000 kilometers. After reaching these freshwater bodies they feed and mature for approximately 10 to 25 years before migrating back to the Sargasso Sea in order to complete their life cycle.
Life stages are detailed below.
1. Eggs:
The eggs hatch within a week of deposition in the Sargasso Sea. McCleave et al. (1987) suggested that hatching peaks in February and may continue until April. Wang and Tzeng (2000) proposed, on the basis of otolith back-calculations, that hatching occurs from March to October and peaks in August. However, Cieri and McCleave (2000) argued that these back-calculated spawning dates do not match collection evidence and may be explained by resorption. Fecundity for many eels is between about 0.5 to 4.0 million eggs, with larger individuals releasing as many as 8.5 million eggs. The diameter of egg is about 1.1 mm. Fertilization is external, and adult eels are presumed to die after spawning. None has been reported to migrate up rivers.
2. Leptocephali:
The leptocephalus is the larval form, a stage strikingly different from the adult form the eels will grow into. Leptocephali are transparent with a small pointed head and large teeth and are frequently described "leaf-like". The laterally compressed larvae are passively transported west and north to the coastal waters on the eastern coast of North America, by the surface currents of the Gulf Stream system, a journey that will last between 7 and 12 months. Vertical distribution is usually restricted to the upper 350 m of the ocean. Growth has been evaluated at about 0.21 to 0.38 mm per day.
3. Glass eel:
As they enter the continental shelf, leptocephali metamorphose into glass eels (juveniles), which are transparent and possess the typical elongate and serpentine eel shape. The term glass eel refers to all developmental stages between the end of metamorphosis and full pigmentation. Metamorphosis occurs when leptocephali are about 55 to 65 mm long. Mean age at this metamorphosis has been evaluated at 200 days and estuarine arrival at 255 days; giving 55 days between glass eel metamorphosis and estuarine arrival. Young eels use selective tidal stream transport to move up estuaries. As they enter coastal waters, the animals essentially transform from a pelagic oceanic organism to a benthic continental organism.
4. Elvers:
Glass eels become progressively pigmented as they approach the shore; these eels are termed elvers. The melanic pigmentation process occurs when the young eels are in coastal waters. At this phase of the life cycle, the eel is still sexually undifferentiated. The elver stage lasts about three to twelve months. Elvers that enter fresh water may spend much of this period migrating upstream. Elver influx is linked to increased temperature and reduced flow early in the migration season, and to tidal cycle influence later on.
5. Yellow eels:
This is the sexually immature adult stage of American eel. They begin to develop a yellow color and a creamy or yellowish belly. In this phase, the eels are still mainly nocturnal. Those remained in estuarine environment continue to go through their life cycle more quickly than those traveled into freshwater. Those in freshwater, however, tend to live longer and attain much larger sizes. Sexual differentiation occurs during the yellow stage and appears to be strongly influenced by environmental conditions. Krueger and Oliveira (1999) suggested that density was the primary environmental factor influencing the sex ratio of eels in a river, with high densities promoting the production of males. From life history traits of four rivers of Maine, Oliveira and McCleave (2000) evaluated that sexual differentiation was completed by 270 mm total length.
6. Silver eels:
As the maturation process proceeds, the yellow eel metamorphoses into a silver eel. The silvering metamorphosis results in morphological and physiological modifications that prepare the animal to migrate back to the Sargasso Sea. The eel acquires a greyish colour with a whitish or cream coloration ventrally. The digestive tract degenerates, the pectoral fins enlarge to improve swimming capacity, eye diameter expands and visual pigments in the retina adapt to the oceanic environment, the integument thickens, percentage of somatic lipids increases to supply energy for migrating and spawning, gonadosomatic index and oocyte diameter increase, gonadotropin hormone (GTH-II) production increases, and osmoregulatory physiology changes.


According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, the American eel is at very high risk of extinction in the wild.
Substantial decline in numbers and fishery landings of American eels over their range in eastern Canada and the US was noted, raising concerns over the status of this species. The number of juvenile eels in the Lake Ontario area decreased from 935,000 in 1985 to about 8,000 in 1993 and was approaching zero levels in 2001. Rapid declines were also recorded in Virginia, as well as in New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island in Canada.
Because of its complex life cycle, the species face a broad range of threats, some of which are specific to certain growth stage. Being catadromous, the eels' reproductivity success depends heavily on free downstream passage for spawning migration. It also depends on the availability of diverse habitats for growth and maturation.
Sex ratio in the population can also be affected because males and females tend to utilize different habitats. Impacts on certain regions may greatly impact the number of either sex.
Despite being able to live in a wide range of temperatures and different levels of salinity, American eels are very sensitive to low dissolved oxygen level, which is typically found below dams. Contaminations of heavy metals, dioxins, chlordane, and polychlorinated biphenyls as well as pollutants from nonpoint source can bioaccumulate within the fat tissues of the eels, causing dangerous toxicity and reduced productivity. This problem is exacerbated due to the high fat content of eels.
Construction of dams and other irrigation facilities seriously decreases habitat availability and diversity for the eels. Dredging can affect migration, population distribution and prey availability. Overfishing or excessive harvesting of juveniles can also negatively impact local populations.
Other natural threats come from interspecific competition with exotic species like the flathead catfish (Pylodictis olivaris) and blue catfish (Ictalurus furcatus), pathogens and parasites, and changes in oceanographic conditions that can alter currents—this potentially changes larval transport and migration of juveniles back to freshwater streams.


The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reviewed the status of the American eel both in 2007 and in 2015, finding both times that Endangered Species Act protection for the American eel is not warranted.
The Canadian province of Ontario has cancelled the commercial fishing quota since 2004. Eel sport fishery has been closed. Efforts have been made to improve the passage in which eels migrate across the hydroelectric dams on St. Lawrence River.


The anhinga (/ænˈhɪŋɡə/; Anhinga anhinga), sometimes called snakebird, darter, American darter, or water turkey, is a water bird of the warmer parts of the Americas. The word anhinga comes from the Brazilian Tupi language and means "devil bird" or "snake bird". The origin of the name is apparent when swimming: only the neck appears above water so the bird looks like a snake ready to strike. They do not have external nares (nostrils) and breathe solely through their epiglottis.
The anhinga is placed in the darter family, Anhingidae, and is closely related to Indian (Anhinga melanogaster), African (Anhinga rufa), and Australian (Anhinga novaehollandiae) darters. Like other darters, the anhinga hunts by spearing fish and other small prey using its sharp, slender beak.


Anhinga species are found all over the world in warm shallow waters. The American anhinga has been subdivided into two subspecies, A. a. anhinga and A. a. leucogaster, based on their location. A. a. anhinga can be found mainly east of the Andes in South America and also the islands of Trinidad and Tobago. A. a. leucogaster can be found in the southern United States, Mexico, Cuba, and Grenada. A fossil species Anhinga walterbolesi has been described from the Late Oligocene to Early Miocene of Australia.
Only birds that live in the extreme north and south of their range migrate and do so based on temperature and available sunlight. Anhingas will migrate towards the equator during winter but this range is "determined by the amount of sunshine to warm the chilled birds". Although not in their usual range, anhingas have been found as far north as the states of Pennsylvania and Wisconsin in the United States.
Kettles of anhingas often migrate with other birds and have been described as resembling black paper gliders.


The anhinga is a large bird, measuring approximately 89 cm (35 in) in length (with a range of 75–95 cm (30–37 in)), with a 1.14 m (3.7 ft) wingspan. The A. a. anhinga subspecies is larger than A. a. leucogaster and has broader buffy tail tips. They weigh on average around 1.22 kg (2.7 lb), with a range of 1.04–1.35 kg (2.3–3.0 lb). The bill is relatively long (about twice the length of the head), sharply pointed, and yellow, and the webbed feet are yellow as well.
The male is a glossy black-green with the wings, base of wings, and tail a glossy black-blue. The tip of the tail is white. The back of the head and the neck have elongated feathers that have been described as gray or light purple-white. The upper back of the body and wings is spotted or streaked with white.
The female anhinga is similar to the male except that it has a pale gray-buff or light brown head, neck, and upper chest. The lower chest or breast is a chestnut color, and the back is browner than that of the male.
The hatchling starts out bald but gains tan down within a few days of hatching. Within two weeks the tan down is replaced by white down. Three weeks after hatching, the first juvenile feathers appear. Juveniles are mostly brown until they first breed usually after the second or third winter.
This bird is often mistaken for the double-crested cormorant due to its similar size and shape, although the two species can be differentiated by their tails and bills. The tail of the anhinga is wider and much longer than that of the cormorant. The bill of the anhinga is pointed, while the bill of the cormorant has a hook-tip.


Anhingas feed on moderately sized wetland fishes, amphibians, aquatic invertebrates and insects. In Alabama, the anhinga's diet consists of fishes (such as mullet, sunfish, black bass, catfish, suckers, and chain pickerel), crayfish, crabs, shrimp, aquatic insects, tadpoles, water snakes and small terrapins. In Florida, sunfishes and bass, killifishes, and live-bearing fishes are primarily eaten by the anhingas. Other fish eaten include pupfish and percids.
Anhingas stalk fish underwater, mainly where there is some flora present. Once they locate their prey, they partly open their bill and stab the fish swiftly. For larger fish, they use both their jaws and use the lower jaw on small fish. If the fish is too large to forage, the anhinga stabs it repeatedly and then lets it go. The anhingas bring their capture to the surface of the water, toss it backwards and engulf it head-first.


The Oriental darter (Anhinga melanogaster) is a water bird of tropical South Asia and Southeast Asia. It has a long and slender neck with a straight, pointed bill and, like the cormorant, it hunts for fish while its body is submerged in water. It spears a fish underwater, bringing it above the surface, tossing and juggling it before swallowing the fish head first. The body remains submerged as it swims, and the slender neck alone is visible above the water, which accounts for the colloquial name of snakebird. Like the cormorants, it has wettable feathers and it is often found perched on a rock or branch with its wings held open to dry.


The Oriental darter is like all other anhingas, a cormorant-like species that has a very long neck. The structure of the neck is as in other species of darter with strongly developed muscles about a kink in the neck at the 8th and 9th vertebrae that allows it to be flexed and darted forward with rapid force to stab fish underwater. The edges of the commissures of the mandible tips have minute inward pointing serrations that hold impaled fish.
The adult plumage above is black and the wing coverts and tertials having silvery streaks along the shaft. The crown and neck are brown shading to black towards the back of the neck. The underparts are blackish brown. A pale line over the eye and throat and a line running along the sides of the neck gives it a striped appearance. The iris is white with a yellow ring (brighter yellow in breeding birds) around it. The tip of the upper mandible is dark while the base is pale brown bill while the lower mandible is yellowish. The legs and webbing on the foot are yellow in immatures and non-breeding birds while breeding birds have darker grey tarsi and toes with yellow webbing. The sexes are not easily distinguishable but males tend to have black speckles that coalesce on the white throat. Adult females have a shorter bill and tend to have the black at the base of neck and chest separated from the hind neck by a wide buff band that ends at the shoulder. This pattern however is also found in immatures whose neck is lighter and lack the long pointed scapulars. In flight the long and slender neck, wide wing and wedge shaped tail make it distinctive. Young birds have a pale brown neck and appear whitish on the underside and lack the white streak along the side of the neck. The inner secondaries or tertials and the central tail feathers appear wavy or corrugated. The tail is long and made up of twelve stiff feathers which are dragged along the ground when the bird attempts to walk or hop on land.


The Oriental darter is found mainly in freshwater lakes and streams. They usually forage singly, with the entire body submerged, swimming slowly forward using their webbed feet while the head and neck is moved jerkily above the water. It darts its neck to impale fish and then brings them out of water, tossing them into the air before swallowing the fish head first. They may sometimes be found along with cormorants which share the habit of spreading out their wings to dry when perched on a waterside rock or tree. They sometimes soar on thermals during the warm part of the day but will alternate flapping and gliding in normal flight.
They nest in mixed species heronries where they build a stick platform on the nest tree which is usually surrounded by water. Several pairs may nest close to each other. The branch is flattened by the birds prior to the placement of the sticks that form the nest platform. The nest sites are defended from other birds with posturing and thrusts of the neck. The breeding season is June to August (during the rainy season) in northern India, April–May in southwestern India and in winter in southeastern India (during the northeast monsoon). The usual clutch consists of three to six spindle shaped bluish-green eggs with a white chalky covering that gets soiled over time. Both parents incubate the eggs, beginning after the first egg is laid which leads to asynchronous hatching of the young. The newly hatched chicks are bare and covered with some down on the head. As they grow, they become covered in white down. The chicks feed by thrusting their heads down the throat of their parents.
Adults go through a synchronous moult of their flight feathers after the breeding season, resulting in the loss of flying ability for a brief period. When disturbed from their perches during this period, they dive into the water below and attempt to escape underwater. This escape behaviour is also employed by chicks at the nest. They are very silent except at the nest where they produce grunts and croaks and a disyllabic chigi-chigi-chigi. Chicks are noisy when begging for food. Adults roost communally in trees close to or over water.
Chicks, especially those more than half grown are sometimes preyed on by raptors such as Pallas's fish eagle (Haliaetus leucoryphus). The long scapular feathers were once popular for use in decorating hats. A number of parasites have been recorded from adult birds including Schwartzitrema anhingi (Trematoda), Petasiger nicolli, Mesorchis pendulus, and Echinorhynchotaenia tritesticulata (Cestoda:Dilepididae).

In some parts of northeastern India, darters were (or are) used by tribals to capture fish from streams. A ring is tied around the neck to prevent them from swallowing the prey just as is done with cormorant fishing in parts of Southeast Asia.


This species builds a stick nest in a tree and lays 3–6 eggs. It often nests with herons, egrets and cormorants.
It often swims with only the neck above water, hence the common name snakebird. This, too, is a habit shared with the other anhingas.
Unlike many other waterbirds the feathers of the African darter do not contain any oil and are therefore not waterproof. Because of this, the bird is less positively buoyant and its diving capabilities are enhanced. After diving for fish, the feathers can become waterlogged. In order to be able to fly and maintain heat insulation, it needs to dry its feathers. Thus the African darter is often seen sitting along the waterside spreading its wings and drying its feathers in the wind and the sun along with cormorants which may share its habitat.


Anolis biporcatus, also known as the neotropical green anole or giant green anole, is a species of anole. It is found in forests, both disturbed and undisturbed, in Mexico, Central America, Colombia and Venezuela. More southern populations, in southwestern Colombia and western Ecuador, were recognized as a separate species, A. parvauritus, in 2017.
As suggested by its common names, the neotropical green or giant green anole is mostly green in color and relatively large, among the largest anoles in the mainland of the Americas. Males have a snout–vent length of about 7.0–10.3 cm (2.8–4.1 in) and the females, which grow slightly larger, about 7.0–10.8 cm (2.8–4.3 in). In general, there is little sexual dimorphism in this species. The tail is roughly double the length of the snout-to-vent.


Major predators include the broadhead skink, snakes, birds, and in urban habitats, cats. Like many lizards, anoles display autotomic tails, which wiggle when broken off. This distracts the predator and helps the anole to escape. A new tail then starts to develop. The new tail, however, containing cartilage rather than bone, will typically not grow back to the same length as the first one, and may exhibit a marked difference in color and texture from the rest of the animal. Green anoles will also try to escape predators by climbing vertical walls, trees, fences, or any vertical surface they can find. This ability is possible due to their enlarged toe pads and great climbing ability.
Anoles are parasitized by some species of sarcophagid flies, including Lepidodexia blakeae. Adult flies will deposit eggs on live anoles, and the fly larvae develop inside the lizard until they emerge from a wound and pupate into adult flies in sediment. Infection is often fatal, with mortality rates possibly as high as 90%.


This species was first scientifically described by André Marie Constant Duméril and Gabriel Bibron in 1837 using a number of specimens sent to Paris by Auguste Plée from Martinique. They also had an additional specimen supposedly from French Guiana, although these two authors doubted the veracity of this provenance, and a further female specimen found in the collection of the Musée National d'Histoire Naturelle, labelled by Nicolaus Michael Oppel as Anolis porphyreus, apparently a nomen nudum. Georges Cuvier had first examined the specimens sent by Plée, and dubbed the lizard le petit Anolis a crête in the second tome of his massive work, Le Règne Animal, a few years before, stating that the taxon Anders Sparrman had called Lacerta bimaculata was a synonym of this species. Duméril and Bibron were not in agreement with this observation, however, and described Sparrman's lizard as A. leachii.
For the next century and a half the taxonomy remained stable and uncontroversial, until Craig Guyer and Jay M. Savage attempted to split the very large genus Anolis in 1986 based on skeletal, immunology and karyological datasets used together in a type of cladistics method called "successive weighted characters", thus moving most species into a new very large genus called Norops. Following Guyer and Savage, Albert Schwartz and Robert W. Henderson reclassified this species as Ctenonotus cristatellus in 1988. Because this splitting caused the new remaining genera to be paraphyletic, most herpetologists chose not to follow this taxonomic interpretation, and within a decade this new nomenclature was seen as a synonym. In 2012 the same authors, together with Kirsten Nicholson and Brian Crother, again tried moving the species to their new genus, this time using more molecular data in their cladistics analysis, but did so less than convincingly. They gave it another go in 2018.


As of 2020 there are two subspecies recognised:
Anolis cristatellus cristatellus – Puerto Rico, including some off-shore islands; introduced elsewhere.
Anolis cristatellus wileyae Grant, 1931 – Culebra and Vieques islands east of Puerto Rico and the U.S. and British Virgin Islands.
In 1975 the authors Schwartz and Richard Thomas reported A. cristatellus cristatellus to be the subspecies present on many of the islands east of Puerto Rico, this was corrected by Heatwole in 1976 who classified these populations as A. cristatellus wileyae. "Hybrids" between the two subspecies were first found on the main island of Puerto Rico and Isleta Marina in the late 1970s and reported by Heatwole et al. in 1981 (this islet is now covered in giant apartment buildings), but by 1988 it appeared that many of the populations occurring on the islands in between the two taxa were intermediate between the two taxa. Schwartz and Henderson recorded such intermediate populations on the islands of Cayo Icacos, Cayo la Llave, Cayo Palominitos (offshore of Isla Palominos) and Isla Pineros. A larger island in this area, Culebra, may also have somewhat intermediate specimens.


The syntypes for the nominate form, MNHN2353 and MNHN2447, are housed at the Musée National d'Histoire Naturelle. It was stated by Duméril and Bibron in 1837 to have been sent from Martinique, but the species does not occur on this island. The Reptile Database, however, records a holotype, MCZ8306 (also catalogued as MCZ2171), being kept at the Museum of Comparative Zoology.
The subspecies wileyae has a holotype, UMMZ73648, kept at the University of Michigan Museum of Natural History along with a number of paratypes; although according to Schwartz and Henderson in 1991 the holotype is MCZ34792.


This subspecies is found on islands off the eastern coast of Puerto Rico, such as Culebra, Culebrita and Vieques, and also on the U.S. and British Virgin Islands. It is widespread on the British Virgin Islands and present on all the major islands and most cays, including Anegada, Beef Island, Fallen Jerusalem Island, Frenchman's Cay, Great Dog Island, Guana Island, Jost van Dyke, Little Thatch, Necker Island, Norman Island Peter Island, Prickly Pear Island, Tortola, Virgin Gorda and West Dog Island. In the U.S. Virgin Islands it occurs on Flanagan Island and Skipper Jacob Rock. This form is not spreading throughout the Caribbean like the other subspecies.
One might question how such a lizard could be present on such a vast number of otherwise small and isolated islets, however, the modern distribution likely does not reflect an exceptional colonising ability of this species to sally forth over marine distances, or that Arawak peoples somehow spread these creatures over the various cays. Instead, what is now a collection of islands was previously connected, only eight to ten millennia ago, in a much larger island stretching from Puerto Rico to Anegada, and since the Eemian era remained such a large island throughout the last ice age. This is an example of vicariant distribution as opposed to overwater dispersal; the modern distribution consists of relict populations reflecting the former geography.


Henderson and Robert Powell (2009) record that this species may be eaten by another anole, A. cuvieri, as well as the non-native mongoose, Herpestes javanicus and the bird Margarops fuscatus, a thrasher. In a 2008 study of the reptilian components of the diets of Caribbean birds, Powell and Henderson record the birds of prey Buteo jamaicensis and Falco sparverius feeding on this anole. Rios-Lopez et al. recorded in 2015 that the Puerto Rican endemic bird Todus mexicanus, a species of tody known locally as San Pedrito, eats this lizard.


The knight anole (Anolis equestris) is the largest species of anole (US: /əˈnoʊ.li/ (listen)) in the Dactyloidae family. Other common names include Cuban knight anole or Cuban giant anole, highlighting its native country, but it has also been introduced to Florida.  In its native Cuba, this large anole is called chupacocote.


Knight anoles are native to Cuba, but have been widely introduced into South Florida, where they reproduce and spread readily as an invasive species. They cannot withstand cold temperatures; in winter freezes in Florida, they have been known to fall to the ground from tree canopies. In highland parts of its native Cuba, a few individuals may rest adjacent to each other during the relatively cold winters (otherwise the species is solitary and highly territorial).
In Cuba they can be seen from near sea level to an altitude of 3,300 ft (1,000 m) in a wide range of habitats with trees, such as forest, mangrove, savanna, cultivated areas and gardens. In its introduced Florida range it even occurs in trees along roads in Miami. Knight anoles are arboreal, mostly found high in trees on the trunk or branches in the canopy, but will descend to the ground to get from one tree to another, or for thermoregulation, when occasionally seen on warm asphalt, rocks, or sidewalks.


Knight anoles are diurnal and fiercely territorial. Initially they turn to face almost any perceived threat, if only from a distance. During its challenge display, a lizard will sit high on all fours, gape menacingly, turn green, and perhaps bob its head. The male will extend its dewlap, and both females and males will "puff themselves up" with air.


When young, its diet consists mainly of insects. As an adult, it mostly eats invertebrates (notably insects and snails), but regularly take fruits and can function as a seed disperser. They may also take small vertebrates prey such as small birds and reptiles (including other anoles), but studies indicate that they do this less frequently than several other anole species.


The brown anole (Anolis sagrei), also known commonly as the Cuban brown anole, or De la Sagra's anole, is a species of lizard in the family Dactyloidae. The species is native to Cuba and the Bahamas. It has been widely introduced elsewhere, via the importation and exportation of plants where the anole would lay eggs in the soil of the pots, and is now found in Florida and as far north in the United States as southern Georgia, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Hawaii, and Southern California. It has also been introduced to other Caribbean islands, Mexico, and Taiwan.
This species is highly invasive.
In its introduced range, it reaches exceptionally high population densities, is capable of expanding its range very quickly, and both outcompetes and consumes many species of native lizards, like the green anole.  The brown anole's introduction into the United States in the early 1970s has altered the behavior and negatively affected populations of the native Carolina anole (Anolis carolinensis, also known as the green anole), which have since generally been relegated to the treetops.


The native range of the brown anole extends over much of the Caribbean, including Jamaica, Cuba, the Cayman Islands, and other countries. Currently, they are considered an invasive species in parts of Florida in the United States, including the Florida Keys, Dade County, Broward County, and Palm Beach County as of 1985. Today, their range has extended as far as Georgia and to parts of Mexico. It is believed that these lizards were unintentionally brought to the area in cargo shipments for the Caribbean, as well as an intentional release of approximately 100 individuals in 1941.
The brown anole tends to live on the ground, avoiding trees and preferring to live in smaller plants and shrubs and is found in both urban and suburban areas. When the weather is warm, the brown anole can be found basking. When it is cold, they prefer sheltered areas.  Brown anoles are less arboreal than the green anoles which are frequently found living in trees, on the ground, or in low vegetation.
Although the brown anole was initially found in the Caribbean and then introduced to southern Florida, the species is now moving north. Specifically, the species has been found in southern Georgia as well as coastal Georgia. Researchers expect that this trend will continue in the coming years and that the brown anole will continue to migrate to other locations in the north. Due to their invasiveness, they are often the dominant reptile species in a given environment.


Brown anoles feed on small arthropods such as crickets, moths, ants, grasshoppers, cockroaches, mealworms, beetles, flies, butterflies, spiders, waxworms, amphipods, and isopods. Brown anoles also feed on other types of invertebrates such as earthworms and snails. They may also eat other lizards, such as skinks and the Carolina anole, lizard eggs, and their own molted skin and detached tails. If near water, they eat aquatic arthropods or small fish – nearly any prey that will fit in their mouths.


Know predators of the brown anole include broad-headed skinks, snakes, birds, and occasionally other species of anoles. More often than not, brown anoles eaten by other anoles are juvenile. Predation by many vertebrates has been observed. Spiders can prey upon young anoles and are one of the few exceptions to this observation.


The coloration of the brown anole allows it to easily blend in with its surroundings, making it difficult for predators to spot. The brown anole has a detachable tail that can be detached if the anole is grabbed by the tail by a predator or used as a distraction, as it twitches after detaching. The tail grows back afterwards, albeit smaller and a duller color. Despite the extensive list of predators, the lizard's alertness and sprint speed make it very difficult for predators to track and capture.


Anomia simplex, the common jingle shell, is a typical species of bivalve mollusc in the family of Anomiidae, sharing attributes to blue mussels, American oysters, and bay scallops. Species related to the family of Anomiidae are often noted for their extremely thin, often translucent, paper-like shells. Anomia simplex can be found in shallow waters, typically estuaries, mainly along the Atlantic Coast of North America; however, they can range from as far north as the coast of Nova Scotia, and as far south as the coast of Brazil.


This beetle is present throughout Europe (Albania, Andorra, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Corsica, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom) It is also found in other regions of the world where cattle have been introduced, such as Australia..


The adults of A. stercorosus  grow up to 12–20 millimetres (0.47–0.79 in) long  and therefore they do not reach the length of the very similar common dung beetle (Geotrupes stercorarius). The body colour is blue-black, while the underside is usually metallic blue. The elytra have seven longitudinal slightly dotted grooves. The wings may be blue, violet or green. Antennae are reddish brown. Geotrupes stercorarius presents three keels on the outer side of the tibia of the third pair of legs, while A. stercorosus presents only two.


The greater white-fronted goose (Anser albifrons) is a species of goose related to the smaller lesser white-fronted goose (A. erythropus). It is named for the patch of white feathers bordering the base of its bill, in fact albifrons comes from the Latin albus "white" and frons "forehead".  In Europe it has been known as the white-fronted goose; in North America it is known as the greater white-fronted goose (or "greater whitefront"), and this name is also increasingly adopted internationally. Even more distinctive are the salt-and-pepper markings on the breast of adult birds, which is why the goose is colloquially called the "specklebelly" in North America.


Greater white-fronted geese are 64–81 cm (25–32 in) in length, have a 130–165 cm (51–65 in) wingspan, and weigh 1.93–3.31 kg (4 lb 4 oz – 7 lb 5 oz). They have bright orange legs and mouse-coloured upper wing-coverts. They are smaller than greylag geese. As well as being larger than the lesser white-fronted goose, the greater white-fronted goose lacks the yellow eye-ring of that species, and the white facial blaze does not extend upwards so far as in lesser.
The male is typical larger in size, both sexes are similar in appearance—greyish brown birds with light grey breasts dappled with dark brown to black blotches and bars. Both males and females also have a pinkish bill and orange legs and feet.
Greater white-fronted geese make a variation of sounds, but notably the most recognizable is the high pitched cackle that can be imitated by the sounds "he-he." There is a distinct breaking of the note from the first cackle to the second.


The greylag goose or graylag goose (Anser anser) is a species of large goose in the waterfowl family Anatidae and the type species of the genus Anser. It has mottled and barred grey and white plumage and an orange beak and pink legs. A large bird, it measures between 74 and 91 centimetres (29 and 36 in) in length, with an average weight of 3.3 kilograms (7 lb 4 oz). Its distribution is widespread, with birds from the north of its range in Europe and Asia migrating southwards to spend the winter in warmer places. It is the type species of the genus Anser and is the ancestor of most breeds of domestic goose, having been domesticated at least as early as 1360 BC. The genus name is from anser, the Latin for "goose".
Greylag geese travel to their northerly breeding grounds in spring, nesting on moorlands, in marshes, around lakes and on coastal islands. They normally mate for life and nest on the ground among vegetation. A clutch of three to five eggs is laid; the female incubates the eggs and both parents defend and rear the young. The birds stay together as a family group, migrating southwards in autumn as part of a flock, and separating the following year. During the winter they occupy semi-aquatic habitats, estuaries, marshes and flooded fields, feeding on grass and often consuming agricultural crops. Some populations, such as those in southern England and in urban areas across the species' range, are primarily resident and occupy the same area year-round.


The greylag is the largest and bulkiest of the grey geese of the genus Anser, but is more lightly built and agile than its domestic relative. It has a rotund, bulky body, a thick and long neck, and a large head and bill. It has pink legs and feet, and an orange or pink bill with a white or brown nail (hard horny material at tip of upper mandible). It is 74 to 91 centimetres (29 to 36 in) long with a wing length of 41.2 to 48 centimetres (16+1⁄4 to 19 in). It has a tail 6.2 to 6.9 centimetres (2+7⁄16 to 2+11⁄16 in), a bill of 6.4 to 6.9 centimetres (2+1⁄2 to 2+11⁄16 in) long, and a tarsus of 7.1 to 9.3 centimetres (2+13⁄16 to 3+11⁄16 in). It weighs 2.16 to 4.56 kilograms (4 lb 12 oz to 10 lb 1 oz), with a mean weight of around 3.3 kilograms (7 lb 4 oz). The wingspan is 147 to 180 centimetres (58 to 71 in). Males are generally larger than females, with the sexual dimorphism more pronounced in the eastern subspecies rubirostris, which is larger than the nominate subspecies on average.
The plumage of the greylag goose is greyish brown, with a darker head and paler breast and belly with a variable amount of black spotting. It has a pale grey forewing and rump which are noticeable when the bird is in flight or stretches its wings on the ground. It has a white line bordering its upper flanks, and its wing coverts are light coloured, contrasting with its darker flight feathers. Its plumage is patterned by the pale fringes of the feathers. Juveniles differ mostly in their lack of black speckling on the breast and belly and by their greyish legs. Adults have a distinctive 'concertina' pattern of folds in the feathers on their necks.
The greylag goose has a loud cackling call similar to that of the domestic goose, "aahng-ung-ung", uttered on the ground or in flight. There are various subtle variations used under different circumstances, and individual geese seem to be able to identify other known geese by their voices. The sound made by a flock of geese resembles the baying of hounds. Goslings chirp or whistle lightly, and adults hiss if threatened or angered.


Greylag geese are largely herbivorous and feed chiefly on grasses. Short, actively growing grass is more nutritious and greylag geese are often found grazing in pastures with sheep or cows. Because of its low nutrient status, they need to feed for much of their time; the herbage passes rapidly through the gut and is voided frequently. The tubers of sea clubrush (Bolboschoenus maritimus) are also taken as well as berries and water plants such as duckweed (Lemna) and floating sweetgrass (Glyceria fluitans). In wintertime they eat grass and leaves but also glean grain on cereal stubbles and sometimes feed on growing crops, especially during the night. They have been known to feed on oats, wheat, barley, buckwheat, lentils, peas and root crops. Acorns are sometimes consumed, and on the coast, seagrass (Zostera sp.) may be eaten. In the 1920s in Britain, the pink-footed goose "discovered" that potatoes were edible and started feeding on waste potatoes. The greylag followed suit in the 1940s and now regularly searches for tubers on ploughed fields. They also consume small fish, amphibians, crustaceans, molluscs and insects.
Greylag geese tend to pair bond in long-term monogamous relationships. Most such pairs are probably life-long partnerships, though 5 to 8% of the pairs separate and re-mate with other geese. Birds in heterosexual pairs may engage in promiscuous behavior, despite the opposition of their mates.
Homosexual pairs are common (14 to 20% of the pairs may be ganders, depending on flock), and share the characteristics of heterosexual pairs with the exceptions that the bonds appear to be closer, based on the intensity of their displays. Same-sex pairs also engage in courtship and sexual relations, and often assume high-ranking positions in the flock as a result of their superior strength and courage, leading some to speculate that they may serve as guardians of the flock. The sexual preference of the birds is generally flexible, as more than half of widowers re-pair with a bird of the opposite sex.
The nest is on the ground among heather, rushes, dwarf shrubs or reeds, or on a raft of floating vegetation. It is built from pieces of reed, sprigs of heather, grasses and moss, mixed with small feathers and down. A typical clutch is four to six eggs, but fewer eggs or larger numbers are not unusual. The eggs are creamy-white at first but soon become stained, and average 85 by 58 millimetres (3+3⁄8 by 2+5⁄16 in). They are mostly laid on successive days and incubation starts after the last one is laid. The female does the incubation, which lasts about twenty-eight days, while the male remains on guard somewhere near. The chicks are precocial and able to leave the nest soon after hatching. Both parents are involved in their care and they soon learn to peck at food and become fully-fledged at eight or nine weeks, about the same time as their parents regain their ability to fly after moulting their main wing and tail feathers a month earlier. Immature birds undergo a similar moult, and move to traditional, safe locations before doing so because of their vulnerability while flightless.
Greylag geese are gregarious birds and form flocks. This has the advantage for the birds that the vigilance of some individuals in the group allows the rest to feed without having to constantly be alert to the approach of predators. After the eggs hatch, some grouping of families occur, enabling the geese to defend their young by their joint actions, such as mobbing or attacking predators. After driving off a predator, a gander will return to its mate and give a "triumph call", a resonant honk followed by a low-pitched cackle, uttered with neck extended forward parallel with the ground. The mate and even unfledged young reciprocate in kind.
Young greylags stay with their parents as a family group, migrating with them in a larger flock, and only dispersing when the adults drive them away from their newly established breeding territory the following year. At least in Europe, patterns of migration are well understood and follow traditional routes with known staging sites and wintering sites. The young learn these locations from their parents which normally stay together for life. Greylags leave their northern breeding areas relatively late in the autumn, for example completing their departure from Iceland by November, and start their return migration as early as January. Birds that breed in Iceland overwinter in the British Isles; those from Central Europe overwinter as far south as Spain and North Africa; others migrate down to the Balkans, Turkey and Iraq for the winter.


The pink-footed goose (Anser brachyrhynchus) is a goose which breeds in eastern Greenland, Iceland and Svalbard. It is migratory, wintering in northwest Europe, especially Ireland, Great Britain, the Netherlands, and western Denmark. The name is often abbreviated in colloquial usage to "pinkfoot" (plural "pinkfeet"). Anser is the Latin for "goose", and brachyrhynchus comes from the ancient Greek brachus "short" and rhunchos "bill".
It is a medium-sized goose, 60–75 cm (24–30 in) long, the wingspan 135–170 cm (53–67 in), and weighing 1.8–3.4 kg (4.0–7.5 lb). It has a short bill, bright pink in the middle with a black base and tip, and pink feet. The body is mid-grey-brown, the head and neck a richer, darker brown, the rump and vent white, and the tail grey with a broad white tip. The upper wing-coverts are of a somewhat similar pale bluish-grey as in the greylag goose, and the flight feathers blackish-grey. The species is most closely related to the bean goose Anser fabalis (having even been treated as a subspecies of it at times in the past), sharing a similar black-and-coloured pattern bill, but differing in having pink on the bill and legs where the bean goose is orange, and in the paler, greyer plumage tones. It is similar in size to the small rossicus subspecies of bean goose, but distinctly smaller than the nominate subspecies fabalis. It produces a medley of high-pitched honking calls, being particularly vocal in flight, with large skeins being almost deafening.


There are two largely discrete populations of pink-footed goose. The Greenland and Iceland population winter in Great Britain, while the Svalbard population winters in the Netherlands and Denmark, with small numbers also in Norway (where it is common on migration), northern Germany, and Belgium.
Populations have risen spectacularly over the last 50 years, due largely to increased protection from shooting on the wintering grounds. Numbers wintering in Ireland and Great Britain have risen almost tenfold from 30,000 in 1950 to 292,000 in October 2004. The numbers wintering in Denmark and the Netherlands have also risen, with about 34,000 in 1993. The most important single breeding site, at Þjórsárver in Iceland (holding 10,700 pairs in 1970), was only discovered in 1951, by Sir Peter Scott and his team who made an expedition to seek the breeding grounds. Within Great Britain, the most important wintering areas are in Norfolk (147,000 in 2004), Lancashire (44,000 in 2004), and Aberdeenshire (primarily on autumn and spring passage). Large to huge wintering flocks graze on farmland; individual flocks can be spectacular, such as the 66,000 at Loch of Strathbeg, Aberdeenshire in early September 2003.


In 1750 the English naturalist George Edwards included an illustration and a description of the snow goose in the third volume of his A Natural History of Uncommon Birds. He used the English name "The blue-winged goose". Edwards based his hand-coloured etching on a preserved specimen that had been brought to London from the Hudson Bay area of Canada by James Isham. When in 1758 the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his Systema Naturae for the tenth edition, he placed the snow goose with the ducks and geese in the genus Anas. Linnaeus included a brief description, coined the binomial name Anas caerulescens and cited Edwards' work. The snow goose is now placed in the genus Anser that was introduced by the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson in 1760. The scientific name is from the Latin anser, "goose", and caerulescens, "bluish", derived from caeruleus, "dark blue". The snow goose is the sister species to Ross's goose (Anser rossii).
Two subspecies are recognised:
A. c. caerulescens (Linnaeus, 1758) – lesser snow goose – breeds in northeast Siberia, north Alaska and northwest Canada, winters in south USA, north Mexico and Japan
A. c. atlanticus (Kennard, 1927) – greater snow goose – breeds in northeast Canada and northwest Greenland, winters in northeast USA
The greater snow goose is distinguished from the nominate form by being slightly larger. It nests farther north and east. The lesser snow goose can be found in two colour phases, the normal white-coloured animals and a dark grey-coloured "blue" phase. The greater snow goose is rarely seen in a blue phase.