20+ Amazing Animals That Start With E

Elephants are among the most intelligent animals on earth, and this is perhaps why they continue to be a source of fascination in human culture. These massive giants exhibit some complex behavior almost akin to humans and others that are prominent and distinct, thus making them the subject of extensive behavioral, anatomical, and cognitive study.

Scientists claim these animals are among the few who have shown evidence of self-awareness and self-recognition with an impressive ability to learn and remember details. They are among the strongest on earth, pulling around 7 tons. 

Formerly known as spiny or spiky anteaters, Echidnas are one of only two mammals that lay eggs. The other is the platypus, and they are both found in Australia. Like most mammals, the echidna feeds its young with milk and has endothermic metabolism and fur.

They also have surprisingly large brains for their size. Interestingly, the echidna is said to be the world's oldest currently living mammal, having evolved since the time of the dinosaurs! It might have evolved from an undiscovered ancestor of the monotremes almost 66 to 23 million years ago during the Paleogene period.

If this animal possessed teeth, scientists may be better able to study its evolution, as teeth fossilize well and help determine mammalian relationships.

An eagle might be the first animal that comes to many people’s minds when thinking about animals with the letter E. They are known as the king of birds because they are one of the strongest birds in the world and can carry medium to large-sized birds four times their body weight with their feet and talons.

Additionally, their golden nape is said to be reminiscent of a crown. There are some 60 species of eagles still living in the world today. They can be divided into several main groups: fish or sea eagles, serpent eagles, bald eagles, and booted eagles, but all of them belong to the family of Accipitrida.

There is a famous simile regarding eels - as slippery as an eel. How did that come about, you may ask? If you didn’t know, eels have a coating much like slime, enabling them to slip away from most catches. This slime also suffocates any disease-causing or parasitic germs that try to enter through the gills.

There are over 800 species of eels, of which many are unknown. Among all species, the white-spotted conger remains the most-eaten fish in Japan. Once cooked, eels are very nutritious, and eating them reduces cholesterol while promoting good eyesight, maintaining skin, hair, and nails.

A common misconception about an electric eel is that many think it’s a type of eel. It is not a true eel. An electric eel is classified as Gymnotiformes, the knife fishes. 

Along the abdomen, the eel has multiple organs that generate a current when it needs to defend itself against predators. A shock releases 1+ amps, enough to induce a severely painful shock, which is why they have no known predators. Only humans eat them. 

Many electric eel species prefer to live in fresh and murky water, predominantly found in South America, the Amazon, and the Orinoco River basins. They look for areas with plenty of food, like crustaceans, invertebrates, amphibians, and fish.

The egret (Ardeidae) is a long-legged, long-necked bird with white or buff plumage and yellow, orange, or black bills. It inhabits most continents except ones that are cold or with arid deserts and high mountains.

It spends its day wading in freshwater and saltwater habitats, catching fish, crustaceans, and aquatic insects, among other creatures. Egrets are social birds. They bond with their mates for one season before looking for a new one the next.

During mating season, the males curve their bodies into an S position and make harsh, croaking noises and nasal squeals to attract a mate, but only after they build a nest platform with sticks and twigs within their colonies. Once they find a mate, the female lays eggs, and both incubate the eggs.

Emus are birds that make their home on the continent of Australia. They can grow as tall as 6.2 feet. They have bluish skin on their neck and head with dark brown feathers that turn a lighter shade of brown as they age. These birds cannot fly, so they use their long legs to escape predators.

When running, one stride of an emu can be 9 feet long or equal to half the height of an adult giraffe.

In addition to using their legs to run, emus use them to kick at predators. Their powerful kick, along with the sharp nails on their toes, can cause injury to predators, giving this bird time to escape. A swift kick from an emu can even kill a dingo.

The eland is one of the biggest antelope species of Africa, with spiraled horns and multiple dark markings along its body like 12 white stripes that help it camouflage against arid savannas. Other than the spiraled horns, it is difficult to identify this species from other antelope species, but it is the largest among them after kudu. 

Elands live in a group with other elands called a herd of up to 500 animals. Despite their large numbers, they aren’t territorial or aggressive, even among males during the breeding season. They tend to roam from place to place looking for food rather than securing a single spot as their own.

An earwig is about half an inch long with flat, long, hard, and shiny body in shades of yellow or brown. An old European myth claims these insects crawl into your ears and tunnel into your brain to lay their eggs while you sleep, hence the name. However, this is not true.

They don’t crawl into human ears and are named as such because their wings resemble a human ear when unfolded. An earwig is an omnivore and consumes living and dead plants and animals. It is advantageous to plants and crops, as it preys on many common garden pests, including aphids, beetles, and maggots.

Who hasn’t seen the cylindrical-shaped, long-segmented, slimy reddish-brown earthworm? If we look at it through a magnifying glass, we might see that its segments are covered with hair-like bristles called setae.

The setae provide friction needed to glide around in the soil and mate. The worms will penetrate their setae into the bodies of other worms to reproduce.  Interestingly, earthworms are capable of estivation, similar to bears hibernating.

Earthworms eat and cocoon themselves in slime-coated balls and go into a sleep-like state until spring rain helps them recover. They estivate during hot summers to survive the drought and in winter, but only if they burrow deep in the soil.

After the moose, the elk is the largest land-dwelling herbivore. They live in mountain meadows, forests, and forest edges of North America, Central Asia, and East Asia. The males are called bulls, while the females are called cows. Most of the year, they segregate themselves into different herds according to gender. 

During mating season, the males will engage in antler wrestling to compete for females. They may also attract the cows with their smell, which they achieve by rolling around in their urine on the ground. 

Once the cows and bulls mate, the gestation period lasts 240-262 days. Once the calves are born, they can join the herd after two weeks and are fully weaned at two months. 

When thinking of animals that start with the letter E, the ermine hardly comes to people’s mind. The ermine is a type of weasel with a long body and a luxurious fur coat that changes color with the season. They are solitary hunters, meaning they forage for doo alone.

On average, an individual ermine can carve out a territory around 25 to 100 acres large, sometimes with force. The ermines only socialize during mating season. They cannot make sounds and do not possess unique physical features to attract a mate.

However, they can emit a scent from their anal gland to let others know they are ready for a mate. Once they copulate, the females are responsible for nurturing the offspring. 

In the 1960s, dog enthusiasts wanted to create a distinct dog type with favorable traits, so they crossed a chow chow and a wolf spitz. The resulting wolf-chow was bred with Samoyeds before ending up with a perfect, fluffy companion pup known as Eurasier, a name representing its European and Asian background.

A Eurasier has a thick coat in various lovely colors such as white, russet, brown, gray, or black. It is calm, adaptable, gentle-tempered, and easy to care for with keen intelligence, making them highly suitable family and child-friendly pets.

If you see Shiro Maguro on a sushi menu, know they may be made from the escolar. Often referred to as butterfish or super white tuna, escolar has full-bodied meat with a potent buttery flavor. It is said to be one of the best-tasting fish around.

However, if it is eaten in large quantities, you might suffer from diarrhea or an uncontrollable seepage of orange oil. Escolar is abundant in Japan, Korea, the United States, and Italy. However, the Japanese government bans this fish for consumption because it is considered toxic.

Eelpouts and eels are not related despite their names. The former is not a true eel type. They look like one with their long, elongated bodies. They are benthic ray-finned fish with outward extending lips, making them look like they are pouting.

Some have uniform color, while others have markings on their body, but most species look brown or tan and range from white to gray or pink to orange. Eelpouts can be found all everywhere in a wide range of marine habitats. That said, most eelpouts reside in the Northern Hemisphere in the Arctic, Northern Atlantic, and Northern Pacific.

Emerald tree boas are nonvenomous boas that inhabit the Amazon Basin and a few South American countries such as Guyana, Colombia, Brazil, Ecuador, Venezuela, and Peru. When they are born, they are brick-red or reddish-orange and transform into emerald green as they mature during their first year.

As adults, they also develop markings that set different species apart. Their diet consists mainly of small mammals, especially rats and marsupials. They do not eat birds or bats as much as scientists assumed. The young eat frogs and lizards and only go after warm-blooded prey once they are old enough.

The Egyptian tortoise is one of the many animals with the letter E in its name. After the speckled tortoise, It is the smallest in the world, fitting comfortably in an adult palm. It was widespread in Egypt, Israel, and Libya but is now facing endangerment due to habitat destruction from human interference.

The Egyptian tortoise is a true herbivore that consumes grass, leaves, and blooms of plants. They consume saltwort and sea lavender plants that naturally grow in their habitat. However, in the wild, they may feed on carrion and insects, although this is unconfirmed.

Emperor penguins are the tallest and largest among all penguin species existing on the planet. They inhabit and survive in the Antarctic sea ice and are considered one of the very few bird species to complete their entire life in its life cycle without ever stepping on the land.

To keep themselves warm in the frigid conditions, they eat around 2 to 3kg daily or double to develop a thick layer of fat that keeps them warm. Emperor penguins choose a different mate every year but breed monogamously for a season.

Once the female lays eggs, they forage for food for two whole months in the sea while the male looks after the eggs. He rests it on his feet to keep it off the frozen ground and covers it with his skin fold to keep the egg warm.

You might see this animal in an exotic pet owners’ collection. An emperor scorpion is one of the most popular scorpions to raise as a pet. It is beginner-friendly because it is docile, and the venom of its sting only causes a mild, localized reaction in most people. This is why it is regularly found in pet stores and reptile expos.

In the wild, emperor scorpions are the largest species, averaging about 6 to 8 inches in length. Their bodies are shiny black and glow pastel blue or green under ultraviolet light. They have two huge pincers in the front, four legs, and a long tail (telson) containing the venom glands that curve back over the body. 

Red-spotted or Eastern newts live in forested parts of eastern North America, in or near swamps, streams, ponds, and small pools of fresh water when the water is low during dry periods. The females lay eggs in standing water, which hatch into larvae after 3 to 8 weeks 

A few weeks later, the larvae develop lungs and transform into efts. They leave the water, live on land for one to three years, and return to the water when they feel the need to reproduce and after going through physical changes that help them survive in the water.

A bird with a red chest probably comes to your mind when you hear the name of this bird. This does not apply to European robins. American robins have red chests, while European robins have orange chests. These orange robins also have bluish-gray feathers on the side of their chest and neck and brown feathers at the back. 

With such coloring, European robins have a sweet look about them. However, the males are aggressive about their territorial. They will attack other birds and their kind if they come too near. The attacks are so aggressive that some places might experience a 10% population decline due to deaths.

Last on our list of animals that start with the letter E is an edible frog. As the name suggests, this frog species is eaten by humans across continents, especially in France, where frog legs are a delicacy. It is a fertile hybrid of two other European Frogs, the Pool Frog and the Marsh Frog.

It sits motionless on the muddy banks, almost like a guard on duty. Unlike many other frog species, the edible frog is most active during the day. Edible frogs eat during the night and most likely to wander off from the water to find a better food supply or relocate.