• Spine: vertebrate (has a backbone)
• Skin: mostly smooth, moist
• Breathing:
  • Adults breathe using lungs
  • Young breathe with gills
• Limbs:
  • Most adults have 4 limbs
  • Young have 0 limbs

• Body Temperature: cold-blooded (body temperature changes with the environment)
• Birth: most lay soft-shelled eggs
  • Most lay their eggs in the water or in a moist environment

American Bullfrog
Wikimedia – Will Brown
Click on image to enlarge it

Slimy Salamander
Wikimedia – Greg Schechter
Click image to enlarge it

• Some frogs live in the water, while
  other frogs live on land
• Long hind legs to help them jump
• Smooth, moist skin
• Require wet or moist habitats to keep
  their skin from drying out
• Frogs can be further split into groups such
  as toads and treefrogs

• Smooth, moist skin
• Require wet or moist habitats to keep their skin from dying out
• Lay their eggs in the water, so they require a nearby water source
• Most have four limbs and lack claws
  and scales

43 species of salamanders

The southeastern United States has more amphibian diversity than anywhere else in the world!

The Red Hills salamander is only found in Alabama! The term for when an organism is native to and only found in one place is called "endemic" or "endemism".
In south central Alabama, there is a region called the Red Hills, characterized by steep ridges, ravines, and rolling hills. The Red Hills salamander can be found in hardwood forests in the Red Hills region.
The Red Hills salamander is brownish purple in color and can reach 10.5 inches in length. It is the largest terrestrial (lives on land) salamander in the U.S.

• Spine: vertebrate (has a backbone)
• Skin: Feathers
• Breathing: lungs
• Limbs: 4 (2 wings and 2 legs)
• Body Temperature: warm-blooded (able to keep a warm body temperature in different environments)
• Birth: lay hard-shelled eggs

• Hunt for prey such as rabbits, squirrels, rats, snakes, and other small animals
• Strong feet (talons) for grabbing prey
• Sharp, hooked beaks for consuming prey
• Include owls, hawks, eagles, vultures,
  falcons and osprey

• Have webbed or lobed feet to easily move through the water
• Have feathers adapted for keeping them warm and dry while in the water
• Include swans, geese, ducks, grebes, teals, and mergansers

• Have feet that allow them to perch (sit).
• Smaller in size than other bird groups.
• Known for singing songs, especially in the
  spring and summer.
• Often colorful (sometimes males are
  colorful than females)
• Include Eastern Bluebirds, American Robins, Northern Cardinals, Warblers, and Wrens

• Have long legs for wading and long toes to help them balance.
• Bills are adapted for feeding. Some probe in the sand or mud with long, slender bills while others have bills that filter food while the bird is swimming.
• Include sanderlings, sandpipers, plovers, gulls, and terns

The state bird of Alabama is the Northern Flicker. The Northern Flicker is fairly large and is brown in color with black bars and black spots on the belly. They are easily recognized by the bright white rump and bright yellow or red under the wings and tail.

They can be found in forests and forest edges throughout the state. They eat ants and beetles and can be found foraging for food on the ground.

• Spine: vertebrate (has a backbone)
• Skin: Some have scales while others are scaleless
• Breathing: Gills
• Limbs: No limbs; have fins used for movement and changing direction
• Body Temperature: cold-blooded (body temperature changes with the environment)
• Birth: Most lay soft-shelled eggs

• Have a skeleton made of cartilage (more
  flexible and bendable than bone)
• Have soft bodies with no scales
• Mainly live in saltwater habitats

• Have jaws and a skeleton made of bone
• Some have scales or armor plating
• Some do not have scales
• Contains groups like gars, sturgeons, and catfish

The vermilion darter can only be found in Turkey Creek, a side stream that flows into the Balck Warrior River system in Jefferson County.

The vermilion darter is a yellowish olive colored fish with greenish stripes on the back and green and maroon spots along its sides. The underside of the fish is a bright reddish scarlet color called vermilion.

Vermilion Darter
Wikimedia – John P. Friel
Click on image to enlarge it

Tha Alabama Sturgeon is only found in Alabama in the Mobile basin. It has been found in deep, fast moving waters with a rocky or sandy bottom.

It can grow up to around 2.5 feet in length and has an elongated snout with four feelers hanging below the mouth. The back and fins are brownish orange, the sides are yellow, and the underside is cream colored.

Alabama Sturgeon
Wikimedia – U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Click on image to enlarge it

Fish Endemics
BiodiversityMapping.org – Clinton N. Jenkins (Florida International University, Saving Nature)
Permission Details
Click on image to enlarge it

• Spine: vertebrate (has a backbone)
• Skin: Hair or fur
• Breathing: lungs
• Limbs: 4
• Body Temperature: warm-blooded (able to keep a warm body temperature in different environments)
• Birth: Live birth

• Live in wooded areas
• Leafy green plant material is main source of food
• Teeth are specialized for grazing
• Male deer have antlers

• Live in forests or swampy areas
• Large front teeth
• Large, strong hind legs for jumping or hopping

• Only mammal with true flight abilities
• Bodies are furry while the thin wings do not have much hair
• Nocturnal (active at night)
• Use echolocation
• Feed on insects

• Large pointy ears, elongated snout, and long tail that hands downward
• Can live in forests, grasslands, and swamps
• Feed mostly on small mammals
• Hunting usually takes place near the den (home)

The Alabama beach mouse is a small field mouse that lives in coastal sand dune habitats. They burrow tunnels in the sand and are active at night. They are characterized by having light colored fur, large ears, and large, dark eyes. This species is only found near the Alabama coastline.

Alabama Beach Mouse
flickr – USFWS Endangered Species
Click on image to enlarge it

The black bear is Alabama's state mammal and is the only species of bear found in Alabama. They can be found in the forests in the north eastern part of the state as well as in areas north of Mobile. Black bears range in color from black to brown or beige and are omnivorous (feed on plants and animals).

• Spine: vertebrate (has a backbone)
• Skin: Dry, scaly
• Breathing: lungs
• Limbs:
  • Turtles, lizards, and alligators have 4
  • Snakes and glass lizards have 0
• Body Temperature: cold-blooded (body temperature changes with the environment)
• Birth: most lay hard-shelled eggs

Eastern Box Turtle
Wikimedia – Stephen Friedt
Click on image to enlarge it

• Have a bony or leathery shell that is part of the turtle's spine, and many turtles can pull the arms, legs, and head into the shell
• Some live in the water, and some live on land

• Large reptiles covered in thick scales with a strong tail
• Long snout
• Four short legs
• Usually found in slow moving freshwater habitats

Eastern Fence Lizard
flickr – Judy Gallagher
Click on image to enlarge it

• Relatively circular body with four limbs
• Bodies are covered in scales
• Long tails

• Long, circular body with no legs
• Bodies are covered in scales
• No eyelids
• Some species live in the water, some live on land, and some live in and around trees

31 species of turtles
50 species of snakes
16 species of lizards

The Alabama red-bellied turtle is the state reptile of Alabama and was once thought to be only found in Alabama. However, there are some that live in Southeastern Mississippi. They prefer sandy bottoms of shallow, slow-moving freswater streams, but they can also be found in more brackish (mixture of freshwater and salt water) waters near the bay.

The Alabama red-bellied turtle is characterized by the color of the belly, which is usually light red or orange in color but can range from pale yellow to deep red. The upper shell ranges from brown to green and usually has red, orange, or yellow markings on the sides.

• Segmented bodies
• Segmented, jointed appendages
• Exoskeleton: hard outer covering
• Can breath through body surface, gills, book lungs (leaf-like breathing structure on underside of organism), or tracheae
• Most lay eggs

Arachnids

Crustaceans

Insects

• Spine: invertebrate (no backbone)
• Skin: Hard outside skeleton (exoskeleton)
• Breathing: Tracheae and book lungs
• Limbs: 8 legs (4 pairs of 2)
• Body Temperature: cold-blooded (body temperature changes with the environment)
• Birth: eggs; some lay eggs in an egg sac

• 2 body sections
• 8 legs attached to the front body section
• Can live in almost any terrestrial (land) habitat aside from extreme cold

• Have one small, round body segment (the 2 body parts that all arachnids have are fused together)
• 8 long, slender legs
• Prefer humid or moist habitats

• 2 body parts include a head and a flat, oval shaped body
• Ticks are parasitic, feeding on the blood of mammals, birds, and other vertebrates
• 2 pairs of mouthparts used to attach to a host

• Have a pair of grasping pincers used to grab and kill prey or defend itself
• Narrow, segmented tail ends with a stinger and is often carried in a forward curve over the back
• Some species have venomous sting

• Spine: invertebrate (no backbone)
• Skin: Hard outside skeleton (exoskeleton)
• Breathing: Gills
• Limbs: 10 legs (5 pairs of 2)
• Body Temperature: cold-blooded (body temperature changes with the environment)
• Birth: eggs

• Sharp snout
• Compound eyes on movable stalks
• Five pairs of smaller appendages on the abdomen, used mostly for swimming and circulating water for breathing; front pair have large, powerful pincers

• Tails are curled under the thorax (midsection)
• Carapace (upper body shield) is usually broad
• First pair of legs is modified into chelae, or pincers

• Semitransparent body flattened from side to side
• Flexible abdomen ending in a fanlike tail
• Appendages are modified for swimming
• Antennae are long and whiplike

• Also called pill-bug, roly-poly, or doodlebug
• Can roll into ball when disturbed
• Have brood pouch on underside where females carry eggs

• Have two pairs of delicate wings covered in scales

• Have a thin waist between
  body segments

• Large eyes with long, slender bodies and two pairs of large, see through wings

• Front wings are hardened, providing a protective covering for the back
  wings and body

• One pair of visible wings
  and large eyes

• Rounded bodies with a long pair of back legs for jumping

157 species of butterflies

The monarch butterfly is the Alabama state insect. It is easily recognized by its bright orange wings with black borders and white spots. The monarch butterfly can be found in Alabama in the spring and summer. In the winter, they butterflies migrate to an overwintering spot in central Mexico.

Monarch caterpillars feed only on milkweed, a wildflower that grows in the eastern United States. Monarch caterpillars can be identified by their bright white, yellow, and black striping.

Outdoor Alabama

Animal Diversity Web

Burke Museum

Dr. R. Scot Duncan

Alabama Coorperative Extension System

Britannica