The Atlas of Migrating Plants and Animals

Featuring 65 plants and animals from around the world

Basking shark

These massive sharks can be found all over the world in arctic and temperate waters, migrating closer to the shore during the summer, where they “bask,” or swim slowly with their large mouths wide open. This shark loves to feast on zooplankton, and, by swimming through a patch of plankton with an open mouth (a technique that is known as “filter feeding”), it is able to capture the plankton using its gill rakers. With its mouth agape like a swollen rib cage, the basking shark can filter almost two thousand tons of water an hour. That is a mouthful!

Amur falcon

Peppering the sky in dizzying flocks of thousands, these dinky but determined falcons migrate an impressive nine thousand miles from Russia and northeast Asia to southern Africa, swooping across the equator on their way. One of the most challenging parts of the Amur falcon’s migration is the passage across the Arabian Sea. This sea crossing is the longest taken by any raptor, lasting two or three days. With nowhere to stop over the open water, the bird uses ocean winds to help propel it along.

Pronghorn

A pronghorn may look modest with its fluffy white rump and big soft eyes, but challenge one to a race and it will beat you without batting an eye. Centuries of running from prehistoric cheetahs and bears have made it the fastest land mammal on the continent. Every year in Wyoming, hundreds of pronghorn follow a 165-mile migration route from the Upper Green River Basin to Grand Teton National Park, the longest land migration in the United States (and what would be the longest in North America if caribou did not knock them off top spot).

Violet

There are hundreds of species of violet that exist, and they enjoy springing up all over the place. The violet comes in all kinds of beautiful hues, including gorgeous shades of blue and purple, and it manages to spread itself around using a particularly exciting way to disperse its seeds. After flowering, the violet grows capsules jam-packed with seeds that slowly dry out. As these pods harden, pressure gradually builds until the seeds have no other choice than to explode out of the plant. Seeds can journey as far as thirteen feet by being propelled in this way.

Leatherback turle

This lovely leatherback is the largest of all living turtles and a relic of long lost sea monsters. Leatherbacks can grow to weigh up to two hundred pounds and spend most of their extensive lives grooving through the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans between foraging sites and nesting grounds. One globe-trotting loggerhead turtle named Yoshi broke records by covering 21,750 miles between Australia and Africa over the span of just two years. Moving its flippers like paddles, the leatherback cuts through the water, using magnetic fields to guide its travels in the same way a skilled sailor might use a compass.

Golden jellyfish

On the island of Eil Malk in Palau, clouds of jellies billow through the waters of Jellyfish Lake. At dawn, the jellyfish cluster with eager anticipation at the lake’s western shore, and, as the sun begins to rise, they propel themselves toward its light. From the water they follow the sun’s arc through the sky, migrating across the lake and stopping before they reach the shadowy waters of the eastern shore. This bizarre but enchanting daily ritual happens all because this species needs sunlight to survive. Each jellyfish is filled with tiny organisms known as zooxanthellae, which creates energy from sunlight and passes it on to the jelly. This is also how the golden jellyfish gets its amazing color.