This page includes all animals that start with the letter J that we plan to cover on Fact Animal. As we publish new content, each of these animals will be linked to their dedicated profile fact pages.
From Jabiru to Jumbo Squid, read extraordinary facts about animals beginning with the letter J.
J
Jabiru
Jacana
Jack Crevalle
Jack Russells
Jack-Chi
Jackal
Jackdaw
Jackrabbit
Jackson’s Chameleon
Jaguar
Jaguarundi
Jaguarundi Cat
Jamaican Boa
Jamaican Iguana
Japanese Bantam Chicken
Japanese Beetle
Japanese Chin
Japanese Giant Salamander
Japanese Macaque
Japanese rat snake
Japanese Spider Crab
Japanese Spitz
Japanese Squirrel
Japanese pond turtle
Japanese Terrier
Japanese Thrush
Japanese Wagtail
Japanese White-Eye
Java Sparrow
Javan Flying Frog
Javan Hawk-Eagle
Javan Kingfisher
Javan Leopard
Javan Munia
Javan Owlet
Javan Pond heron
Javan Rhinoceros
Javan Rusa
Javan Scops Owl
Javan Warty Pig
Javan Whistling Thrush
Javanese
Javelina
Jay
Jellyfish
Jerboa
Jerboa Kangaroo
Jerusalem Cricket
Jewel Beetle
Jewel Scarab
Jewel Wasp
Jikin
John Dory
Jojoba Bug
Jonah Crab
Joro Spider
Jumbo Squid
Jumping Bean Moth
Jumping Pit Viper
Jumping Spider
Junco
Jungle Carpet Python
Jungle Nymph
Jungle Owlet
Junglefowl
Juniper Shieldbug
Juniper Titmouse
Please see our Animal A-Z list for animals that start with different letters.
Animal Names That Start With J
Read on for an overview of each of the animals listed above that begin with the letter J.
Jabiru
The Jabiru is a large stork from South and Central America and occasionally the US. It has characteristically long legs, light grey plumage and a black, bald head and neck. Jabirus are extremely tall, standing at up to 1.4 meters in large males.
Fun Fact: The jabiru has one of the largest wingspans of any bird and second-largest in the Americas at 2.8 meters across.
Jacana
Jacanas are lanky wading birds from Sub-Saharan Africa, Asia and the Americas. They have sharp beaks and rounded bodies and are often very colourful. Their large feet and elongated toes allow them to walk along lilies and other aquatic plants.
Fun Fact: Jacanas are unusual in that in most species it’s the male who does all the work of incubating, hatching and looking after the chicks.
Jack Crevalle
The jack crevalle, or crevalle jack, is a common species of jack fish from the tropical and temperate zones of the Atlantic. It grows to over a meter in length and more than 30 kg, has a deep body with a silvery-orange/green tint, orange fins and a blunt face.
Fun Fact: Despite looking kind of derpy, this is a formidable predator of smaller fish, receiving up to 94% of its calories from the active hunting of fish species.
Jack Russell
The Jack Russel is a small terrier breed of domestic dog originally bred for fox hunting in England. They’re highly intelligent and energetic dogs that often give the terrier line a good name in the context of family pets. They’re typically around 30cm tall and a mix of white and tan.
Fun Fact: Jack Russels have an inherent stubbornness and are prone to aggressiveness towards other animals as a result of their hunting lineage, but when this is tempered by diligent obedience training, they’re excellent working and companion animals.
Jackal
Jackals are small canids from Eurasia and Africa. They’re grouped by their ecological niche rather than their genetic closeness, as all are important mesopredators and opportunistic omnivores. All three species are around the size of a large fox, with wolfish colouration.
Fun Fact: Black-backed Jackals are thought to be the oldest remaining species in the Canis genus, predating wolves.
Jackdaw
Jackdaws are small corvids very similar and closely related to crows. They have a black head and wings but usually sport a lighter grey vest or at least neck ruff. They have wider heads with shorter beaks.
Fun Fact: As corvids, Jackdaws are remarkably intelligent and can be often seen “surfing” from cliffs in gusty weather, having great fun playing together.
Jackrabbit
Jackrabbits, more commonly known as hares, are lepidopterans from the Lepus genus. They’re similar in appearance to rabbits but have a larger, more athletic build and longer ears. Jackrabbits are more solitary and wandering than rabbits and substantially faster.
Fun Fact: A Jackrabbit on the run is a sight to behold. At peak sprint, they can hit speeds of up to 80 km/h.
Jackson’s Chameleon
Jackson’s chameleon is a stunning, three-horned chameleon endemic to East Africa. Males are large, reaching up to 38cm long, powerfully built and usually bright green, sporting three facial horns. Females are a little smaller and more brown and grey.
Fun Fact: Males of this species are less territorial than most chameleons and in certain hotspots, they can be found on almost every tree in the area.
Jaguar
Jaguars are robust and elusive jungle cats from the Americas, very similar-looking to leopards but bigger and more muscular at up to 155 kg.
Fun Fact: Jaguars are highly specialised ambush predators, able to stalk and pounce on large prey, which, unlike leopards, they kill with a powerful bite to the skull or spine.
Jaguarundi
The Jaguarundi is a small to medium-sized wild cat native to the Americas. It grows to about 36 cm long and weighs around 5 kg, and unlike other similar American cats has a solid colour, grey-brown coat with a small, round head and short ears.
Fun Fact: Jaguarundis make the most of the daylight hours to hunt, taking advantage of the time most other cats are sleeping.
Jamaican Boa
The Jamaican boa does exactly what it says on the tin. It’s a 2m true boa endemic to Jamaica and feeds mostly on birds and other small vertebrates. It’s an unusual colour, starting with a golden green at the head end, fading to black down the body.
Fun Fact: In its ecosystem, this snake is a top predator. It used vines and large tropical plants to climb and camouflage itself while stalking bird nests.
Jamaican Iguana
The Jamaican iguana, as the name suggests, is a large iguana species native to Jamaica. Once widespread its range was catastrophically reduced to the point where it was thought to be extinct until 1990 when a tiny population was discovered.
Fun Fact: The small Asian mongoose, introduced to the islands to kill snakes, has all but wiped out this species of iguana, but upon the miraculous discovery of that small population, the species stands a great chance of recovery.
Japanese Bantam Chicken
The Japanese bantam is an ornamental or exhibition breed of chicken. They have short legs and come in various combinations and solid variations of black and white.
Fun Fact: These chickens are very much a toy breed, with pretty rubbish genetics. Around 25% of their eggs don’t even hatch.
Japanese Beetle
The Japanese beetle is a scarab beetle from Japan, introduced to North America and Europe. It has a golden brown wing case and the colourful iridescence common in the family.
Fun Fact: This beetle is a perfect example of ecological limiting factors. In Japan, its populations are kept in check by natural predators; where populations have been introduced, they have become a tremendous pest on account of the lack of natural predation in those countries.
Japanese Chin
The Japanese chin is a fluffy little short-faced dog from China, possibly given to Japanese royalty by China in the AD 700s. They’re about 30cm tall, weigh around 5 kg, and have long, black and white hair.
Fun Fact: This breed is known to be eerily cat-like in its behaviours, even washing its face with its paws, and perching with agility on high points around the house.
Japanese Giant Salamander
The Japanese giant salamander is a huge, fully aquatic salamander from Japan. They grow up to 1.5 meters long and the heaviest on record weighed over 25 kg. It’s a dappled brown and prehistoric-looking animal with a flattened tail for paddling.
Fun Fact: Despite its size, this is only the third largest salamander in the world! Its slow metabolism means it can go weeks without eating and live longer than 50 years.
Japanese Macaque
The Japanese macaque is a terrestrial monkey from Japan weighing around 11 kg and standing just over half a metre tall. They have stubby, short tails and brown or grey fur with a pink face and bum.
Fun Fact: This is the species of monkey from the iconic photos of a family of macaques bathing in the hot springs, surrounded by snow and frost.
Japanese Rat Snake
The Japanese rat snake is a non-venomous colubrid snake from Japan, growing up to two meters long, slender, and ranging in colour from a pale yellow to a dark green.
Fun Fact: A German zoo has successfully produced hybrids of this species with another, North Asian species in the same genus. Just to see if they could.
Japanese Spider Crab
The Japanese spider crab is a true crab species found around the marine waters of Japan. It is an enormous crustacean, measuring almost four meters in leg span, and weighing almost 20kg.
Fun Fact: This is a heavily armoured animal already but the crab also sticks bits of sponge weeds and other animals to the top of its carapace as camouflage.
Japanese Spitz
The Japanese spitz is a small and fluffy domestic dog breed of around 30cm tall with a square body and a thick white coat. They are the larger cousins of the Pomeranian.
Fun Fact: Unlike so many specific purebred dogs, this one seems to have few to no inherent health problems as a result of their genetics.
Japanese Pond Turtle
The Japanese pond turtle is a close relative of the Chinese box turtle, endemic to Japan. It’s a slightly flattened turtle, aquatic, with a grey-brown to yellow shell. These turtles grow to about 20cm long and live for up to 40 years.
Fun Fact: These turtles are well equipped for life in the water, but do like to bask on land and will sometimes be found pottering about there, too.
Japanese Squirrel
The Japanese squirrel is a species of squirrel from the same genus as the American grey and Eurasian red squirrels. It resembles the Gray squirrel but is smaller, and endemic to Japan.
Fun Fact: This squirrel loves walnuts. Where they’re available, over one-third of its diet will come from walnuts alone, and has evolved the most efficient feeding method to eat them as fast as possible.
Japanese Terrier
The Japanese terrier is a small, white terrier with a black head, of about 3 to 4 kg in weight, said to be swift and lively. It was originally bred to hunt small game.
Fun Fact: This breed is known to be highly alert, responding with excitement to the slightest noise, making them both good and bad to have in the home, depending on the context.
Japanese Thrush
The Japanese thrush is a medium-sized thrush species that migrates from China and Japan to Laos and Vietnam seasonally. Males have a black head, breast, back, wings and tail, females are more brown with a white belly.
Fun Fact: This thrush is notoriously elusive, and rarely seen. Its presence is more often confirmed by listening for its call.
Japanese Wagtail
The Japanese wagtail is a small wagtail species from Korea and Japan. They’re 20cm long with a black head, throat and back, and a white belly. Like other wagtails, they eat insects.
Fun Fact: These little birds roost in huge groups in the trees, all wagging away – something nobody knows why they do.
Japanese White-Eye
The Japanese white-eye now refers to two species of whiteye found in East and Southeast Asia. They’re very small, greenish-yellow birds with sharp, straight beaks and a white ring around their eyes.
Fun Fact: After being introduced to Hawaii in 1929, this species rapidly made the islands their home and the white-eye is now the most abundant land bird in Hawaii.
Java Sparrow
The Java finch, or Java sparrow, is a pretty little finch from Indonesia, with a blue-grey back, pink belly, black and white head and triangular, red beak. They grow up to 20cm long and feed mostly on grains and seeds.
Fun Fact: This species has a long history with humans, who have kept them as pets for centuries. They can become very tame and won’t attempt to escape if let out of their cages.
Javan Flying Frog
The Javan flying frog is a shrub frog endemic to the island of Java. It grows to about 5cm long, has a large tympanum ear, and is mostly brown with darker blotches.
Fun Fact: Species in this genus jump from tree to tree, using their wide-webbed feet for guidance, giving them the nickname “Flying frogs”.
Javan Hawk-Eagle
The Javan hawk-eagle is a stunning raptorial bird from Indonesia. It’s around 60cm long, barred grey or brown almost all over with a rufous head and neck, and a large crest on the head.
Fun Fact: This species is heavily threatened by habitat loss and is currently endangered, but a recent survey shows that conservation efforts appear to be working, and there are more birds now than were surveyed in 2009.
Javan Kingfisher
The Javan kingfisher is a small bird with a comically large beak. It’s a true kingfisher, in the same genus as the Woodland kingfisher but not nearly as well-proportioned. It has all the colours of a kingfisher but looks like it was drawn by someone who’s never seen a kingfisher.
Fun Fact: Despite (or perhaps because of) the enormous beak, this bird rarely bothers to try to catch fish, and prefers to take insects and other small animals on land.
Javan Leopard
The Javan leopard is a subspecies of leopard found only on the island of Java. They stalk monkeys, pigs and deer, and populations are dotted about the island.
Fun Fact: This subspecies has been isolated from its mainland ancestry for around 800,000 years, having crossed into Java on a land bridge that no longer exists and gradually became a distinct taxon.
Javan Munia
The Javan Munia is a tiny finch from Indonesia, introduced to Singapore and Malaysia. It’s dark brown with a white belly and robust, black beak.
Fun Fact: This bird does really well in cultivated areas, and so has spread successfully into its introduced habitats.
Javan Owlet
The Javan owlet is a small, brown owl native to the tropical, moist lowland forests of Java and Bali. It has a stocky body and a round head, with a white belly.
Fun Fact: This is the only owlet on Java, distinguishable from the scops owls by its colour, so it is a popular owl to identify.
Javan Pond Heron
The Javan pond heron is a very pretty, small heron species from the wetlands of Southeast Asia. It’s around 45cm long, with white wings and a yellow beak.
Fun Fact: During mating season, this heron changes from a dull, flecked and slaty white plumage to a distinctive brown and white, and even its legs change colour from grey to yellow.
Javan Rhinoceros
Javan rhinos are the most endangered of the five rhino species, restricted to a single national park in Java, Indonesia. They’re dusky grey, with a single horn, standing at around 1.7 meters tall and weighing around 2 tonnes.
Fun Fact: These are some of the most endangered animal species in the world, with perhaps as few as 70 left in the wild.
Javan Rusa
The Javan rusa is a Cervid deer native to Indonesia and East Timor. It’s a slender and powerful animal with dark, blackish-brown fur and wide ears.
Fun Fact: These shy deer are hard to spot in the daytime, very skittish, and almost entirely nocturnal.
Javan Scops Owl
The Javan scops owl is a small species of owl from the volcanoes of Java. It grows to about 18cm long and has wide wings for gliding long distances. It’s mostly brown with flecks of white and has short ear tufts and a powerful, hooked beak.
Fun Fact: Compared with the relentless chattering of other scops owls, this one is pretty silent and will generally only make a racket when alarmed.
Javan Warty Pig
The Javan warty pig is a true Suid from multiple Indonesian islands. It’s mostly black, with some rufous fur on its head and belly and is named for its three pairs of facial warts. Large males weigh about 100kg.
Fun Fact: This pig is more solitary than many, sometimes forming small groups of up to three, but more commonly found alone.
Javan Whistling Thrush
The Javan whistling thrush is a thick, dark blue flycatcher endemic to Bali and Java. It lives in forests from 800 to 2400 meters up and spends a lot of time on the ground.
Fun Fact: Despite the name and appearance, this isn’t a true thrush, and sits in the family Muscicapidae with the other Old World flycatchers.
Javan Tiger
The Javan tiger was a powerful big cat and a subspecies of tiger that lived in Java until it went extinct sometime between 1940 and 1990. This subspecies grew to around 2.5 meters long and weighed up to 140 kg.
Fun Fact: This tiger was said to be able to break the legs of horses and water buffaloes with a swipe of its paws
Javelina
The Javelina, or peccary, is a strange little ungulate that looks a lot like a pig but is only a close relative. They grow to 1.3m long and weigh no more than 40 kg and live in the Americas. Like pigs, they’ll eat more or less anything.
Fun Fact: Peccaries have interlocking canine tusks that prevent side-to-side motion of their jaws. This is one obvious feature that sets them apart from pigs.
Jay
Jays are stocky and colourful corvids with a heavy build and a powerful beak. They’re opportunistic omnivores and intelligent birds, usually more colourful than most corvids, with browns and blues that are rare in the family.
Fun Fact: Despite being a cold-blooded killer of baby birds, the Eurasian jay also distributes acorns all over the place, helping seed oak forests over its range.
Jellyfish
Jellyfish is a name given to a number of species within the Cnidarian phylum. They are usually a mature, sexually reproducing stage of an animal that often has a polyp stage preceding it, and generally comprise a muscular bell and long, dangly, venomous tentacles.
Fun Fact: Jellyfish have enormous variation across species, with the smallest being half a millimetre long and the largest over two meters across the bell.
Jerboa
Jerboas are long-limbed desert rodents with huge ears and feet that get around by hopping. They hop very effectively around North Africa and Central Asia and are highly adapted to bipedal locomotion.
Fun Fact: Jerboas live fast and die young. They can evade owl predators at speeds of up to 25 km/h and live for only 2 or three years/
Jerboa marsupial
The Jerboa marsupial, or kultarr, is a small, insectivorous marsupial from Central Australia. Named after the jerboa, these evolved hopping and bipedal locomotion independently, and get around almost as quickly as their namesake.
Fun Fact: This marsupial is in the Dasyuridae family, a group of marsupials that fill very similar ecological niches to rodents, though they evolved entirely separate from them.
Jerusalem Cricket
The Jerusalem cricket is a chunky orthopteran, related to and resembling crickets but from a different family. They’re flightless, with fat abdomens and bulbous, round heads.
Fun Fact: These insects look a bit squishy and soft but they have huge mandibles and can give a painful bite if picked up.
Jewel Beetle
The Jewel beetles are a family of ornate and metallic wood boring beetles, usually elongated and oval, and found in multiple colours and patterns.
Fun Fact: Jewel beetles are specialists in wood borers, and can pick up pine smoke from 80 km away. They can also see in infrared, and use this to move toward forest fires, where they can lay their eggs on freshly burned wood.
Jewel Scarab
Jewel scarabs are a genus of glossy metallic scarab beetles found all over the Americas but primarily in Mexico and Central America.
Fun Fact: These incredibly shiny beetles get their lustre from a wing case made of up to 70 crossing layers of chitinous carbohydrate exoskeleton. Different layers reflect different frequencies of light, giving them an incredible iridescence.
Jewel Wasp
The jewel wasp, or emerald cockroach wasp, is a solitary hunting wasp from Africa, Asia, South America and the Pacific islands. It has a metallic blue-green body with red legs and grows to about 2cm long.
Fun Fact: The hunting method of this wasp is terrifying. First, it paralyses the front limbs of the cockroach by targeting specific ganglia, and then it injects the brain with venom, blocking its escape response. It then chews off the antennae and leads the roach to its burrow like a dog on a leash.
John Dory
The John Dory is a beautiful coastline marine fish with a laterally flattened body, olive-yellow patterned scales and ten long dorsal spines. It grows to 65 cm and flaps about gently in the shallows looking ornate.
Fun Fact: This fish is so thin that you can barely see it head-on. All its glorious appendages make it a bad swimmer though, so it has to stalk its prey carefully.
Jonah Crab
The Jonah crab is a large, orange-brown crab species from the East Coast of North America. Large examples grow to 22cm across and resemble the European brown crab.
Fun Fact: These crabs are in an evolutionary battle with coastal gull species, who predate upon them. They are often found in deeper water to avoid this but get their best forage at the intertidal zone where all the nutrients are washed up.
Joro Spider
The Joro is a long and colourful nephilid spider found throughout Korea, Taiwan, China and Japan. They’re typically yellow on the abdomen with black and yellow striped legs. Large females will have a 2.5cm body and even longer legs.
Fun Fact: The females of this species make webs that are several meters across, and glow gold in sunlight and have three layers of web in one, making them very unusual among the Nephila group.
Jumbo Squid
The Jumbo squid, also commonly called the Humboldt squid, is a terrifying, 2-metre long, deep-water marine predator from the Eastern Pacific. They have two long tentacles, covered in up to 200 suckers with razor-sharp teeth on each of them.
Fun Fact: Humboldt squid are the coyotes of the ocean. Mean, smart, and potentially very dangerous if you get surrounded by them. They have a piercing beak and hunt in packs.
Jumping Bean Moth
The Jumping bean moth is a moth from Mexico that’s named after the behaviour of its larvae, which burrow into seeds and, when the seeds are heated in the pan, start jumping around inside them to escape.
Fun Fact: After all the excitement of being a larva, the caterpillar pupates and emerges as a moth with no mouth, that will only see the light of the world outside its bean for a couple of days.
Jumping Spider
Jumping spiders are a family of relatively small, active predators that roam around using their incredible vision to chase down and jump on prey. They rarely get larger than a centimetre and come in all kinds of colours.
Fun Fact: Jumping spiders are some of the most interesting arthropods to study cognition with. Their excellent eyesight makes them easy to train and they have proven to be very intelligent.
Jumping Viper
The Jumping viper is a venomous pit viper endemic to Mexico. It grows to about 60cm long and has the typical pit viper pattern of dart triangles on a brown background. They’re very thick snakes, slightly triangular in cross-section.
Fun Fact: These snakes can’t jump, they just have very good PR. They’re only able to strike out to about a third of the length of their bodies.
Junco
The Junco is a small passerine from North America in the New World sparrow family. It’s a genus, but beyond that, not many can agree on its systematics. They’re usually small, brown and grey, and sparrow-like.
Fun Fact: As an example of the complexity of this genus’s taxonomy, one species is said to have at least eight subspecies, split into two ‘groups’ and spread across all of North America.
Jungle Carpet Python
The Jungle carpet python is a stunning python subspecies from the rainforests of Australia. They grow to over two meters long and have vibrant yellow and black colouration, or black and tan in some morphs.
Fun Fact: This very striking colour pattern might look frightening, but as a true python, this snake is a nonvenomous constrictor and not large enough to do any harm to a person.
Jungle Nymph
The jungle nymph is a huge species of stick insect from Southeast Asia. They are bright, leafy green or brown and females grow to 17 cm long. Their head, body and legs are all thorny.
Fun Fact: While the females are massive, the males are significantly smaller at around 10 cm long. The females have to be huge to lay what are the largest eggs that come out of any insect: 1.3cm long.
Jungle Owlet
The jungle owlet is a small, solitary owlet from the Indian subcontinent. It’s barred all over, mostly brown and grey with a somewhat orange beak. They sit in scrub and deciduous forests, hunting insects, birds, reptiles and rodents at dawn and dusk.
Fun Fact: This species is identified by a lack of the eye spots found on the back of the head of most other owlet species.
Junglefowl
Junglefowl are four species in the Gallus genus, originating in Sri Lanka. One of these is the direct ancestor of the domestic chicken, and like chickens, junglefowl are opportunistic omnivores who would rip your face off if they could but happen to be too small, so they generally stick to seeds and grass.
Fun Fact: Chickens descend from at least one species of junglefowl, Gallus gallus, the red junglefowl, and are commonly considered a subspecies: G. g. domesticus.
Juniper Shieldbug
The juniper shield bug is a very big true bug at around a centimetre long. It’s green and typically shield-shaped with brown markings.
Fun Fact: As a true bug, this insect needs to pierce things to eat, and as its name suggests, it parasitised juniper plants. But over time it has come to move onto cypress, as juniper becomes scarce.
Juniper Titmouse
The Juniper titmouse is a tiny, grey passerine bird in the chickadee family with a dark eye and legs and, a grey crest, and often seen hanging upside down in juniper and pine wooded areas in western North America, hunting insects and spiders.
Fun Fact: This titmouse only became recognised as its own species in 1996, after ornithologists realised it makes a very different call, lives in a different place and has totally different DNA than what is now the oak titmouse.
What Other Animals Begin With ‘J’?
That completes our list of animals that begin with the letter J.
Hopefully you’ve learned a few new ones, but are there any that we’re missing in our list that you would like to see covered?
If so, get in touch. Please see our Animal A-Z list for animals that start with different letters.