B brings the giants and the tinies: the biggest animal that has ever lived shares this letter with a bat lighter than a penny. Here are more than 20 real animals that start with B, with fun facts and links to the ones we cover in depth.
Common animals that start with B
Here’s the full roster of B animals at a glance — every one of them real, and the linked names lead to our in-depth profiles.
- Baboon — a big, clever monkey that lives in noisy troops across Africa
- Bactrian camel — the two-humped camel of Central Asia’s cold deserts
- Badger — a stocky, striped-faced digger famous for its toughness
- Bald eagle — America’s national bird, a fish-catching raptor with a seven-foot wingspan
- Bat — the only mammal that truly flies; there are more than 1,400 species
- Bear — eight species of powerful, smart mammals found from the Arctic to the tropics
- Beaver — a dam-building rodent whose orange teeth never stop growing
- Beluga whale — a white Arctic whale so chirpy it’s nicknamed the canary of the sea
- Bengal tiger — the most numerous tiger, prowling the forests and mangroves of India
- Bighorn sheep — a mountain climber whose males crash horns in famous head-butting battles
- Bison — the largest land animal in North America, weighing up to a ton
- Blackbuck — an Indian antelope with elegant spiral horns and incredible speed
- Blue whale — the largest animal that has ever lived — bigger than any dinosaur
- Bobcat — North America’s most common wild cat, named for its short, bobbed tail
- Brown bear — the wide-ranging bear family that includes the grizzly and the Kodiak
- Buffalo — the massive wild cattle of Africa and Asia, famous for defending their herds
- Bullfrog — the biggest frog in North America, with a call that booms like a foghorn
- Bumblebee — a fuzzy, round bee that can buzz-pollinate flowers other bees can’t
- Bumblebee bat — the smallest bat on Earth, weighing about as much as a penny
- Butterfly — an insect that tastes with its feet and starts life as a caterpillar
Wild animals that start with B
A few of these B animals deserve more than one line. Here are the wildest stories behind the letter.
Bobcat
The bobcat is the wild cat you’re most likely to share a neighborhood with in North America, even if you never see it. About twice the size of a house cat, it hunts rabbits, squirrels, and mice at dawn and dusk, then vanishes into brush and rocky cover. Its stubby ‘bobbed’ tail gives it its name.
Bengal tiger
The Bengal tiger is the classic orange-and-black tiger of India’s forests and the swampy Sundarbans mangroves. Tigers are the largest cats in the world, and each one wears a stripe pattern as unique as a fingerprint. Unlike most cats, Bengal tigers are strong, willing swimmers.
Brown bear
The brown bear ranges across North America, Europe, and Asia — the grizzly is its most famous form. The hump on its shoulders is pure digging muscle, powering claws that can tear open logs and hillsides for food. Before winter, a brown bear can eat tens of thousands of calories a day to fatten up for its long den sleep.
Bumblebee bat
The bumblebee bat of Thailand and Myanmar is the world’s smallest bat and one of the smallest mammals alive, at roughly the weight of a penny. It roosts deep in limestone caves and flutters out at dusk to hunt tiny insects. Scientists only discovered it in the 1970s.
Beluga whale
The beluga whale lives in Arctic seas and is one of the chattiest animals in the ocean, squeaking, clicking, and whistling so much that sailors called it the sea canary. Its flexible neck lets it turn its head, which most whales cannot do. Belugas are born gray and slowly turn white as they grow up.
Bighorn sheep
Bighorn sheep rams settle arguments by sprinting at each other and slamming horns with a crack that can echo for a mile. Their skulls are specially built to absorb the impact. Lambs can climb cliffs within a day or two of being born, following their mothers across ledges barely wider than a sneaker.
B animals to explore in depth
Want more than one-liners? These are the B animals World Deer covers in real depth.
Bats
Our bat guides cover the only mammals capable of true flight — over 1,400 species strong, from the tiny bumblebee bat to big fruit bats with wings longer than your arm. Bats find insects in total darkness using echolocation, and a single little brown bat can catch hundreds of insects in an hour. Far from spooky, they’re some of the most helpful animals in your neighborhood.
Bears
World Deer’s bear section profiles the whole bear family, from the American black bear to polar bears and rare species like the Andean bear. You’ll learn how bears really spend the winter, what they eat through the seasons, and how to tell a black bear from a brown bear at a glance.
Beavers
The beaver is North America’s largest rodent and one of the only animals besides humans that reshapes whole landscapes. Its dams create ponds and wetlands that hundreds of other species depend on. Beaver teeth are orange because they contain iron, which keeps them strong enough to fell trees — and they never stop growing.
B animals at a glance
| Animal | Type | Habitat | Fun fact |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baboon | Mammal | African savannas and rocky hills | Troops can number more than 100 members |
| Bald eagle | Bird | Lakes and coasts of North America | Builds the biggest nest of any North American bird |
| Beaver | Mammal | Ponds and streams of North America and Europe | Slaps its tail on the water to warn of danger |
| Beluga whale | Mammal | Arctic and sub-Arctic seas | Nicknamed the canary of the sea for its constant chatter |
| Bison | Mammal | North American plains | Can sprint faster than 30 miles per hour despite weighing up to a ton |
| Blue whale | Mammal | Oceans worldwide | The largest animal ever — its heart alone weighs hundreds of pounds |
| Bobcat | Mammal | Forests, deserts, and suburbs of North America | Named for its short, bobbed tail |
| Bullfrog | Amphibian | Ponds and lakes of North America | Its deep call sounds like a foghorn saying jug-o-rum |
| Bumblebee bat | Mammal | Limestone caves in Thailand and Myanmar | The smallest bat in the world, about the weight of a penny |
Questions kids ask about B animals
What’s a cool animal that starts with B?
The bumblebee bat is hard to beat — it’s the smallest bat on the planet, light enough to sit on your fingertip without you really feeling it. If you prefer big and mysterious, the bobcat lives near millions of people who never spot it, and the beluga whale chats so much it earned the nickname sea canary.
What’s the biggest animal that starts with B?
The blue whale — and it’s not just the biggest B animal, it’s the biggest animal that has ever existed, larger than any dinosaur we know of. A blue whale can grow longer than two school buses parked end to end, and its heart is about the size of a small go-kart. On land, the bison and brown bear are the heavyweights of this letter.
Is a bobcat dangerous to people?
Almost never. Bobcats are shy, quiet hunters that want nothing to do with humans and usually slip away long before you’d see them. They hunt rabbits, rodents, and birds — not people or large dogs. Like any wild animal, one should never be cornered, fed, or handled, but simply living near bobcats is nothing to worry about.
From a bat you could balance on one finger to the largest creature in the history of life, B covers the entire size range of the animal kingdom. If one of these caught your eye, follow its link — our full profiles cover diets, babies, and survival tricks that wouldn’t fit on this page.
