Content
- Types and classification of carnivorous animals
- Characteristics of carnivorous animals
- Examples of carnivorous animals
- Mammals
- reptiles
- fish and amphibians
- birds
- Invertebrates
As their name implies, carnivorous animals that can be vertebrates or invertebrates, are those that are feed mainly on meat, whether from live or dead animals. The word "carnivore" comes from the Latin carnivorus, which literally means "meat eater", and in ecological terms it's called zoophagous.
If you want to know more about the carnivorous animals with examples and trivia, don't miss this PeritoAnimal article in which we'll teach you everything you need to know about these animals, which are the ones at the top of the food chain.
Types and classification of carnivorous animals
There are 2 types of carnivorous animals depending on how they get their food and they are the predators and the scavengers.
Predatory carnivores are those animals that hunt their prey (usually herbivorous animals), watching them and chasing them until they reach them. In contrast, carnivores butchers, such as vultures or hyenas, are those animals that take advantage of the remains of dead animals that were hunted by stonecutters or that died from some disease. In short, predatory carnivores feed on live meat and butchers on dead meat.
Anyway, there are some specific names to call those animals that feed on only one type of living being, like insectivores or entomophages that only eat insects (like spiders), or piscivores that only eat fish (like pelicans) .
In addition, although they do not consider themselves animals, there are also other living beings that only eat meat, such as carnivorous plants such as Venus flytraps or carnivorous fungi.
However, not all carnivorous animals eat exclusively meat and that is why we are going to show you this classification of sub-species of carnivorous animals according to their degree of ingestion:
- strict carnivores: those animals that feed exclusively on meat since they do not have the necessary organs to digest plant foods. These consume more than 70% meat in their total diet, for example tigers.
- Flexible carnivores: those animals that normally eat meat but their body is adapted to occasionally digest plant foods.
- occasional carnivores: those omnivorous animals that, for reasons of vegetable scarcity, are forced to consume only meat for a certain period of time. These consume less than 30% meat in their total diet, such as raccoons.
Characteristics of carnivorous animals
The main characteristic of carnivorous animals is that they have a shorter digestive tract than other species, since meat takes longer to digest, it starts a putrefaction process that could cause many diseases in the animal (this also happens to humans when they eat meat, since our digestive system is longer and looks more like that of herbivorous animals) and, furthermore, they do not need to decompose the cellulose of vegetables.
Another characteristic of carnivorous animals, especially predators, is that they have a series of agencies specializing in chasing, hunting, catching and tearing their prey like their claws, teeth, a strong jaw, a good sense of smell, an athletic and muscular body like in the case of felines, or even organs that secrete venom to immobilize or kill their prey with their teeth, like venomous snakes.
Examples of carnivorous animals
Next, let's show you some examples of carnivorous animals that we can find all over the planet:
Mammals
Within mammals, which are those warm-blooded animals that feed their offspring through the production of milk secreted by mammary glands, the main carnivores are all cats, like the tiger, the lion, the puma or the domestic cat. They are also carnivorous mammals some canids like wolves or coyotes, or even domestic dogs, although there is debate around this topic. We also have the hyenas, some mustelids like ferrets, some bats and all cetaceans (whales and dolphins) are also carnivores.
reptiles
As for reptiles, which are those vertebrate animals with epidermal keratin scales, those that are carnivores are all of the family crocodylid, in which alligators and crocodiles are found, all coppers and some turtles such as sea turtles.
fish and amphibians
The carnivorous fish par excellence are sharks such as whale sharks, and osteichthyes fish such as spider fish or eels. In amphibians we find frogs, toads and salamanders.
birds
Within birds we can differentiate between birds of prey or day and night birds of prey. In daytime birds of prey we find eagles or hawks, and in nocturnal birds of prey we find owls or owls. Also examples of carnivorous animals are penguins and pelicans. And let's not forget the vultures, big scavengers.
Invertebrates
And last but not least, some examples of carnivorous invertebrate animals, that is, that do not have a bony skeleton, are some crustaceans, all molluscs, such as octopuses, some gastropods and also spiders, scorpions and some insects like wasps or the praying mantis.
