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mammals

Mammals are an important group of vertebrates characterized by the presence of mothers feeding their offspring. Notable characteristics of mammals include lactation, body hair, endothermy (warm-blooded animals), and a four-chambered heart. There are many species of mammals, living in almost all ecosystems on Earth, from the deep sea to the mountains, from tropical rainforests to the cold polar regions.

  • scientific name:Mammalia

  • Features

    • suckle:Females have mammary glands that secrete milk to feed their young.

    • Body hair:Most mammals are covered with hair.

    • Endothermic:Maintaining a constant body temperature through metabolism.

    • Four-chambered heart:Mammals have four-chambered hearts to ensure efficient oxygen delivery.

    • viviparous:Most mammals reproduce by giving birth to live young, but some species, such as monotremes (e.g. the platypus), lay eggs.

  • Habitat:Almost all habitats on Earth, including land, ocean, fresh water, polar regions, etc.

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Mammal classification table

Mammals are numerous and can be subdivided based on different biological characteristics. Mammals are roughly divided into three subclasses:

  1. Monotremata: Oviparous mammals.

  2. Marsupialia: Kangaroos, koalas, etc., whose young continue to develop in a pouch outside the mother's body.

  3. Eutheria: Viviparous mammals, the most abundant species, including humans, lions, whales, etc.

The following is a detailed classification table of mammals, including all orders, families, genera and typical animals:

sortOrderFamilyGenusExamples
MonotremataMonotremataOrnithorhynchidaeOrnithorhynchusPlatypus, Echidna


TachyglossidaeEchidnaEchidna
MarsupialiaMarsupialiaMacropodidaeMacropusKangaroos, wombats, possums


PhascolarctidaePhascolarctoskoala


DasyuridaeDasyurusBandicoot, Tasmanian devil
EutheriaCarnivoraCanidaeCanisWolf, dog, fox


FelidaeFelisHouse cat, lion, tiger


UrsidaeUrsusBlack bear, brown bear, polar bear

PerissodactylaEquidaeEquusHorse, donkey, zebra


RhinocerotidaeRhinocerosWhite rhino, black rhino


TapiridaeTapirusTapirus

ArtiodactylaBovidaeBosCattle, antelopes, sheep


CervidaeCervusDeer, reindeer, sika deer


SuidaeSusWild boar, domestic pig

CetaceaBalaenidaeMegapteraHumpback whale, blue whale


DelphinidaeDelphinusDolphins, killer whales

PrimatesCercopithecidaePongoOrangutans, gibbons, monkeys


HominidaeHomoHumans, chimpanzees, orangutans

RodentiaSciuridaeSciurusSquirrels, Ground Squirrels


CastoridaeCastorbeaver


MuridaeMusHouse mouse, vole

ChiropteraVespertilionidaeMyotisSmall bat, big bat

LagomorphaLeporidaeOryctolagusRabbit, hare

Characteristics and Adaptations of Mammals

Mammals are one of the most diverse groups in the biological world. Here are the main characteristics of mammals and how they adapt:


1. Breastfeeding

A notable feature of mammals is that mothers secrete milk through their mammary glands to feed their offspring. This allows mammal cubs to receive adequate nutritional support after birth, increasing their survival rate.


2. Body hair

Almost all mammals have body hair, which not only helps to keep warm, but also plays a camouflage or display function in some species. For example, the white hair of polar bears helps them camouflage in the snow and reduce the risk of being discovered by prey.


3. Homeothermy

Mammals maintain a stable body temperature through metabolism, which allows mammals to maintain a suitable temperature regardless of changes in the outside temperature. This feature allows mammals to survive in a variety of environments, including extreme environments such as polar regions and deserts.


4. Viviparity

Most mammals reproduce by giving birth to live young, which allows the embryo to receive more stable nutritional support in the mother's body and be more viable after birth. Some species, such as kangaroos and koalas, adopt marsupial parenting.


5. Diet

Mammals have a variety of diets, from herbivorous to carnivorous and omnivorous. Some species (such as bats) have even evolved to suck blood. Different diets allow mammals to find living space in a variety of ecological environments.


Summary: Mammals are the most advanced animals with the most perfect physiological functions. There are more than 4,000 existing mammals. Almost all mammals are warm-blooded. Feeding their offspring with breast milk is one of their most notable characteristics. Mammals include nearly 30 orders, including Monotremes, Carnivores, Primates, Perissodactyla, and Artiodactyla.

Carnivora Primates Rodents Chiroptera Eulipotyphla Ungulata Cetacea Lagoiformes Pangolins Proboscidea Monotremata
Western Long-beaked Echidna

Western Long-beaked Echidna

Western Long-beaked Echidna,Long-nosed Spiny Anteater,New Guinea Long-nosed Echidna,Long-beaked Echidna,Long-nosed Echidna,Zaglossus bruijnii

Features:It is the largest member of the monotreme

Echidna long-rostris Zaglossus bruijnii) Western Long-beaked Echidna, Long-nosed Spiny Anteater, New Guinea Long-nosed Echidna, Long-beaked Echidna, Long-nosed Echidna, almost twice the size of the short-rossed echidna, is the largest member of the monotreme order, with no subspecies.Although they d...

Tachyglossus aculeatus

Tachyglossus aculeatus

Tachyglossus aculeatus

Features:It is the most widely distributed and common monotreme in existence

The Australian echidna Tachyglossus aculeatus is adapted to an ant-eating lifestyle and lives in rocky, sandy and scrub areas, living in crevasses and self-dug burrows. Come out at dusk and night. Powerful claws for digging. Usually on the ground activities, encounter danger, can quickly dig into th...

Hipposideros pratti

Hipposideros pratti

Hipposideros pratti

Features:One of the larger bats

The Przewalski's bat is a large bat that lives in large, damp, dark caves. In large groups of dozens or hundreds of bats, many other bats can be seen in the same hole, but they do not mix. Go out at night. It eats insects. Because the males of this species form particularly well-developed skin l...

Hipposideros pomona

Hipposideros pomona

Hipposideros pomona

Features:The ears are particularly large, the body hair is long and soft; the back hair is gray-brown and slightly white, with pointed hair.

Lesser hoofed bats are smaller. It lives in wet caves or abandoned bomb shelters. It is a relatively common species, usually gathering tens or hundreds of large groups, and other species of bats can be seen in the same cave. Nocturnal activity. Insectivorous, mostly lepidoptera insects.Fly in the ev...

Hipposideros larvatus

Hipposideros larvatus

Hipposideros larvatus

Features:The central anterior nasal protuberance is spherical, followed by a shallow longitudinal groove in the center.

The Mesohoofed bat is a member of the genus Hoofed Bat of the family Hoofed Bat. There are five subspecies of the horseshoe bat in the world, but the exact number of subspecies distributed in China has been debated. Mesohooves live in colonies in various cave...

Hipposideros cineraceus

Hipposideros cineraceus

Hipposideros cineraceus

Features:The auriculae are yellowish brown, blunt-pointed and relatively large

The grey horseshoe bat is a cave bat. About 50 species were found in the air raid shelter of Zhidong Village, Mingjiang Town, Chongzuo Ning, Guangxi. It is found in Gulong Cave and Shuangbai Mine in Yuanjiang, Yunnan. Also living in the same caves are the small hoofed bats...

Hipposideros armiger

Hipposideros armiger

Great Himalayan Leaf-nosed Bat,Hipposideros armiger

Features:It is one of the largest species of insectivorous bats in China.

The big horseshoe bat is very large, with forearms up to nearly 100 mm, ears are also large, triangular, hair is long and dense, body color changes, back color smoke brown or even black brown, belly color gray brown, some purple brown.Large horseshoe bats often live in tens or hundreds of individual...

Lesserbrownhorseshoebat

Lesserbrownhorseshoebat

Lesserbrownhorseshoebat,Rhinolophussineno

Features:The back hair is brown, the belly hair is light.

The new distribution record of this species was reported in China in 2005. Alice C. Hughes et al. recorded its capture in the ecological monitoring survey of Xishuangbanna Botanical Garden in Yunnan Province (see photo), which is the northernmost distribution of this species. Abroad, it is mainly di...

Chinese Horseshoe Bat

Chinese Horseshoe Bat

Chinese Horseshoe Bat, Chinese Rufous Horseshoe Bat

Features:Small eyes and big ears, host of new coronavirus, host of SARS

The Chinese Rhinolophus rouxii sinicus was previously classified as a subspecies of Rhinolophus rouxii sinicus (Chinese name for Rhinolophus rouxii sinicus) until 1997. Due to chromosome and morphological studies, it is very different from Rhinolophus lui, so it was promoted to a separate species in...

Schnitler’s Horseshoe Bat

Schnitler’s Horseshoe Bat

Features:It is endemic to China.

The species is found in a rocky cave surrounded by agricultural land, 200m from the nearest village. Rhinolophus macroetalis, Rhinolophus mari, Rhinolophus chinensis and Myotis were also collected from the same cave. This species is named Schnitler's Horseshoe Bat in honor of Professor Hans-Ulri...

Rhinolophus rex

Rhinolophus rex

Rhinolophus rex

Features:The nose leaves are peculiar, with a total length of 14 mm.

A female bat, Rhinolophus rex, was caught 100m away from the entrance of Kunebian Cave on Kunebian Mountain in Shijiaba Town, Xingshan County, Hubei Province, at 10 am on December 11, 2007, during a survey of biodiversity in caves between Yichang and Badong sections of the Shanghai to Chengdu Expres...

Rhinolophus blythi

Rhinolophus blythi

Rhinolophus blythi

Features:

R. blythi andersen: Least horseshoe bat is the smaller of the horseshoe bats. It lives in caves, tunnels, or near settlements in low mountains. They live in common with other bats. The number is small,1-5 heads in a group, occasionally 20 large groups. Homogenous groups occur seasonally. Prey on mot...

Rhinolophus pearsonii

Rhinolophus pearsonii

Rhinolophus pearsonii

Features:The body hair is long and soft, tan or dark brown.

Rhinolophus pearsonii (Rhinolophus pearsonii) is a member of the Rhinolophidae, genus Rhinolophus. The body size is medium, from the side view, the joint protrudent tip is low round, and there is no concave gap between the saddle-like structure, from the front view, the saddle-like structure is narr...

Rhinolophus marshalli

Rhinolophus marshalli

Lesser Brown Rhinolophus

Features:The ear shell is wide and long, and the antitragus is well developed and slightly triangular.

Rhinolophus maculata is a small cave bat. It has been seen living in the same cave with Rhinolophus sinicus, Rhinolophus pusillus, Hipposideros pomona, etc. It is an insectivorous bat that hibernates. Rhinolophus maculata belongs to the <philippinesis>-<group> and is easily confused with...

Big-eared Horseshoe Bat

Big-eared Horseshoe Bat

Big-eared Horseshoe Bat

Features:The body size is small, the ears are large, the hooves of the nose lobes are broad, the middle is obviously engraved, and the two sides of the front have small appendages.

Rhinolophus macroetalis is a bat of the genus Rhinolophidae. It lives in small numbers in caves and commutes with other bats, generally staying on the edge of caves or on the top wall of rocks near the entrance. Feeds on nocturnal flying insects.This species contains 3 subspecies in China and has a...

Rhinolophus luctus

Rhinolophus luctus

Rhinolophus luctus;woolly horseshoe bat

Features:The largest species of horseshoe bat in China, it lives alone or in pairs and is very rare.

The Great Rhinolophus lives in caves, often sharing a cave with other species of Rhinolophus and Hoofed Bats, but always hangs alone on the cave ceiling, and most of them are in a brighter place not far from the cave entrance. One captured in Suichuan, Jiangxi, was hanging less than 3m above the gro...

Rhinolophus huananus

Rhinolophus huananus

Rhinolophus chinensis

Features:The ears are large, with a correspondingly small antitragus.

The number of South China Rhinolophus is relatively rare, and it is a cave-type bat. It can be seen living in the same cave with Chinese Rhinolophus (<Rhinolophus sinicus>), small-footed bat (<Hipposideros pomona>), big-eared Rhinolophus (<R. macrotis>), etc. Before the publication...

Greater Horseshoe Bat

Greater Horseshoe Bat

Greater Horseshoe Bat

Features:The ears are large and slightly broad, with pointed ends

There are species of mouse-eared bat and Oriental bat in the roost cave. During the day and night, sleep between stone cracks or wall cracks during the day, hanging alone on the stone wall, hanging with two limbs and upside down on the stone wall, forelimbs wrapped around the body, when external sou...

porpoise

porpoise

Cetacea LC

Features:It's a relatively small toothed whale

The porpoise (Phocoena phocoena in Latin), also known as porpoise, is the most common toothed whale in the North and Baltic Seas.Porpoises prefer calmer waters at a medium depth of about 20 meters near the coast, but occasionally swim deeper into the ocean.Porpoises feed almost exclusively on fish,...

Sotalia fluviatilis

Sotalia fluviatilis

South American long-beaked dolphin, Amazon River white-sided dolphin

Cetacea LC

Features:The body is stout, the beak is prominent, and the forehead is slightly rounded.

Tucuxi dolphin (scientific name: Sotalia fluviatilis) is also known as tucuxi in English. There is no subspecies.Although they may let ships approach, most Tucuxi dolphins are wary of ships. They may ride on the waves caused by passing ships, but will not perform bow riding. Often seen peeping, tail...

Cephalorhynchus heavisidii

Cephalorhynchus heavisidii

South African dolphin, Hiwig's dolphin, Benguela dolphin

Cetacea LC

Features:The dorsal fin is a distinct triangle, and the body color is a striking black, white and gray pattern.

Haviside's dolphin (scientific name: Cephalorhynchus heavisidii) is called Haviside's dolphin in foreign language, and has no subspecies.Haviside's dolphin is cautious by nature and sometimes quite shy. It is rare to see them jumping, but they have been known to leap more than 2 meters o...