AboutJonathan Wright Expertise I can answer questions about wild mammals, as well as other wild animals. I can also answer questions on extinct animals and zoos.
PLEASE DON'T SEND ME ANY QUESTIONS ABOUT PETS. IF YOU ARE REALLY WORRIED, YOU SHOULD CONTACT A VETERINARIAN. PLEASE DO NOT ASSUME THAT UNPAID PEOPLE ON ALLEXPERTS ARE AVAILABLE 24 HOURS A DAY AND WILL PROVIDE YOU WITH ADVICE THE MOMENT YOUR ANIMAL GETS ILL. Find out how to look after a pet before you get it. It is unfair to keep an animal in inappropriate conditions and give it the wrong food. If you can't keep an animal in good conditions, please don't bring it into your home. I'm not a vet and I don't have any expertise in animal medicine and care. I don't agree with people taking animals out of the wild and then expecting other people to give free advice on how to look after them. It is cruel to take animals away from their parents, who are able to look after the babies and may look for them, while putting their other babies at risk. You may need a licence to look after some animals. You may be breaking the law by keeping wild animals; please check with a local wildlife organisation.
IF YOU FIND AN INJURED ANIMAL, PLEASE CONTACT A WILDLIFE VETERINARIAN OR CHARITY AND LET TRAINED STAFF LOOK AFTER THE ANIMAL. DO NOT TRY TO LOOK AFTER AN INJURED ANIMAL IF YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING.
Please do not remove eggs from nests. The mother birds will know the right temperature for the eggs and will not sit on them if the temperature is warm enough for them to develop naturally. It is illegal to remove eggs of some species and, unless you have an incubator or a broody hen, the egg may not develop. If you are allowed to touch the eggs, you can candle them (check details on websites) to see if the eggs are fertile. If the eggs are not fertile, they will not hatch.
I do not agree with fights between different animals. Please do not ask me questions about them.
Experience I have a zoology degree and have been interested in animals since I was two years old. I am a zoo volunteer at London Zoo. I have appeared on a BBC Radio Quiz, 'Wildbrain'.
Organizations World Wide Fund for Nature. Zoological Society of London. London Bat Group.
Publications Newsletters of London Zoo volunteers and the London Bat Group
Education/Credentials BSC degree in Zoology. 'A' levels in Zoology and Chemistry. 'O' Level in Biology.
Question My daughter is 8yrs. old and is doing a report on France, one of the questions she needs to answer is to identify animals typically found there. Can you help? Thank you.
Answer Dear Sheryl
Thanks for your question. I have looked up a few websites, but the bulk of my information came from a library book: ‘France' by Bob Gibbons. This is one of the Travellers' Nature Guides, published by Oxford University Press in 2003. It is based around different locations, but I have made a list of the named animals, according to how they are classified. Please note that there are thousands of species of animals living in France, but I have made a list of those emphasised by the book and websites I studied. Some of the animals I have listed occur in Corsica and I don't know if they also occur in France, even though they feature in the library book. I'm sorry if this makes the list confusing.The term 'animals typically found there' is a bit confusing. Did your daughter want to know about animals which are common in France (and some other countries) or animals unique to France? I have compiled a list of animals found in France and I hope this is what is required. Please note that some of these animals are much commoner than others and that some animals stay hidden and may be hard to see, even though they can be quite abundant.
France has few large mammals. These include red deer, roe deer, ibex, chamois and wild boar, as well as common seals and common dolphins. Other mammals include the polecat, crested porcupine, Alpine marmot, weasel, pine and beech martens, muskrat, water vole, brown and mountain hares, wolf, coypu, red squirrel, snow vole, European wildcat, European beaver, genet, European otter, northern lynx, red fox, common and garden dormice, water, common, pygmy and pygmy white-toothed shrews and European badger. Bats include the Brandt's, pond, Nathusius's, Savi's and common pipistrelle, noctule, Daubenton's, grey and brown long-eared, greater and Mediterranean horseshoe, Leisler's, Geoffroy's, whiskered, Natterer's, Bechstein's, greater mouse-eared, European free-tailed, serotine, barbastelle, northern and parti-coloured bats. There are small populations of brown bears and lynx high in the Pyrenees and the Pyrenean desman is very rare.
France has an abundance of bird life. Many species of migrating birds, including ducks, geese, and thrushes, spend their winters in France. I have placed most of the following birds in alphabetic order, based on their common names. French birds include the alpine accentor, avocet, bee-eater, bittern, little bittern, bluethroat, brambling, cirl, Ortolan, rock and snow buntings, little bustard, honey and common buzzards, capercaillie, red-billed and Alpine choughs, coot, great cormorant, spotted crake, common crane, common crossbill, great spottd cuckoo, curlew, stone curlew, dipper, great northern, red- and black-throated divers, turtle, rock and stock doves, white-headed and ferruginous ducks, dunlin, spotted, white-tailed sea, short-toed, booted and golden eagles, little, great white and cattle egrets, eider, Eleonora's falcon, fieldfare, snow and citril finches, firecrest, greater flamingo, pied flycatcher, fulmar, gadwall, gannet, garganey, bean, red-breasted, white-fronted, greylag and Brent geese, black- and bar-tailed godwit, goldeneye, goosander, goshawk, little, great crested and black-necked grebes, greenshank, hazel grouse, guillemot, Mediterranean, slender-billed, black-headed, yellow-legged, lesser and great black-backed and little gulls, Montagu's, marsh and hen harriers, hawfinch, Squacco, grey, night and purple herons, hobby, hoopoe, jackdaw, common and lesser kestrels, kingfisher, black and red kites, kittiwake, knot, lammergeier, lapwing, crested and short-toed larks, linnet, mallard, house, sand and crag martins, red-breasted merganser, merlin, nightingale, nightjar, nutcracker, golden oriole, osprey, ring ouzel, tawny, Tengmalm's, eagle, pygmy, long-eared, scops and short-eared owls, oystercatcher, rock partridge, peregrine, storm petrel, pintail, tawny, water, tree and rock pipits, grey, golden, Kentish, little ringed and ringed plovers, pochard, red-crested pochard, collared pratincole, ptarmigan, puffin, water rail, raven, razorbill, redpoll, common and spotted redshanks, black redstart, redwing, bearded reedling, roller, sanderling, pin-tailed sandgrouse, purple, wood, green, common and curlew sandpipers, common and velvet scoters, serin, shag, Manx, Yelkouan and Cory's shearwaters, shelduck, shoveler, red-backed, great grey and woodchat shrikes, skuas, skylark, smew, snipe, jack snipe, rock sparrow, sparrowhawk, spoonbill, black-winged stilt, Temminck's stint, stonechat, black and white storks, red-rumped and common swallows, purple swamp-hen, Bewick's and whooper swans, pallid, common and alpine swifts, teal, Arctic, whiskered, little, Sandwich, common, whiskered and black terns, rock and blue rock thrushes, crested and penduline tits, short-toed and common treecreepers, turnstone, griffon and Egyptian vultures, blue-headed, grey and yellow wagtails, wallcreeper, marsh, wood, great reed, sedge, reed, Cetti's, melodious, grasshopper, fan-tailed, Icterine, subalpine, Bonelli's, Orphean, Savi's, moustached, subalpine, Dartford, yellow-browed and Sardinian warblers, northern and black-eared wheatears, whimbrel, whinchat, common and lesser whitethroats, wigeon, woodlark and the great-, lesser- and middle-spotted, green, white-backed, grey-headed and black woodpeckers and wryneck. The black vulture has been reintroduced into France. Rare species include the lesser kestrel, Richard's pipit, red-breasted flycatcher, yellow-browed warbler, corncrake, little bustard, Audoin's gull and Corsican nuthatch.
Reptiles are relatively rare in France and the only venomous reptile in France is the adder. Other French reptiles include the Hermann's tortoise, European and pond terrapins, Montpellier, western whip, Montpellier, Aesculapian, grass, ladder and smooth snakes, Orsini's viper, Turkish, Moorish and the European leaf-toed geckos, slow-worm and the sand, wall, common, green, ocellated and Spanish psammodromus lizards. Amphibians include the Tyrrhenian painted, stripeless and common tree, Iberian water, pool, parsley, marsh, agile, painted, edible, common and moor frogs, marbled, palmate, alpine, smooth and crested newts, Pyrenean brook and fire salamanders and the common, natterjack, western spadefoot, midwife, yellow-bellied and green toads. The Corsican salamander and Corsican brook salamanders are endemic to Corsica.
Fish include seahorses, pipefishes, mullets, eels, carps, pikes, Atlantic salmon, sea bream, rainbow wrasse, painted comber, grouper, brown trout and tench.
Insects include butterflies (Cleopatra, grayling, brown argus, two-tailed pasha, meadow brown, mountain clouded yellow, large heath, false ringlet, hedge brown, sooty, Larche and water ringlet, wall, gatekeeper, lesser purple emperor, common and scarce swallowtail, silver-spotted skipper, orange tip, brimstone, Idas, Adonis, common and chalkhill blue, Duke of Burgundy, white-letter and purple hairstreak, large copper, map, lesser purple emperor, large tortoiseshell, Camberwell beauty, marbled, wood, peak and rock white, dark green, shepherd, Queen of Spain and pearl-bordered fritillary, grizzled, large grizzled, chequered and marbled skippers and clouded Apollo butterflies), moths (Mother Shipton, forester, emperor, hummnigbird hawkmoth, Clifden nonpareil, latticed heath, chimney sweep, burnet and lobster moths), dragonflies (Norfolk, southern and hairy hawker, orange and orange-spotted emerald, banded demoiselle, four-spotted and scarce chaser, common, red and white-faced darter, golden-ringed, black-tailed and keeled skimmer and lesser emperor dragonflies), damselflies (emerald, small red, variable, orange, scarce emerald and small blue-tailed damselflies), beetles (red cardinal, bloody-nosed, musk, rove, tiger, ground, glow-worm, rose and bee chafer, stag, lesser stag, longhorn, water and minotaur beetles), lacewings, velvet ants, bee-killer, bee-wolves, soldier flies, sand, ruby-tailed, digging ground-hoppers, caddisflies, mayflies, hoverflies, needle-flies, shield-bugs, conopid flies, hornets, solitary bees, ichneumons, field, mole and wood crickets, bog, zizi, great green, Roesel's and grey bush-crickets and large marsh, long-winged and short-winged conehead, woodland, mottled and blue-flashing grasshoppers.
Other invertebrates include the wasp, tarantula and water spiders, scorpions, crayfishes, spiny and common lobsters, medicinal leech, ragworms, lugworms, white-lipped snail, fan mussel, sea fan and red coral.
I have spent a few hours compiling this list and I hope this is useful. When I was eight years old, I knew a few obscure aniamls, but I don't know if your daughter just wanted a list of well known animals, or even just a list of mammals.
