Endangered Animals Quiz
Pandas, pangolins, condors and the last two northern white rhinos: 15 questions on the animals we nearly lost.
Which organisation publishes the Red List of Threatened Species, the global ranking of how close each species is to extinction?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
IUCN
The International Union for Conservation of Nature has published the Red List since 1964, placing species in categories from Least Concern through Vulnerable, Endangered and Critically Endangered to Extinct.
The Red List now assesses more than 150,000 species, and over a quarter of them are classed as threatened with extinction.
Which Arctic animal is listed as Vulnerable mainly because climate change is shrinking the sea ice it hunts from?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Polar bear
Polar bears depend on sea ice to hunt seals, and the IUCN lists them as Vulnerable because the ice is forming later and melting earlier each year, forcing bears to fast for longer.
The global polar bear population is estimated at roughly 22,000 to 31,000 animals spread across 19 subpopulations.
The dodo, hunted to extinction in the 17th century, lived only on which island?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Mauritius
The flightless dodo was found only on Mauritius in the Indian Ocean, and within a century of Dutch sailors arriving in 1598 it had been wiped out by hunting and introduced rats, pigs and monkeys.
No complete dodo skeleton from a single bird exists, and the last stuffed specimen was thrown out by an Oxford museum in 1755.
In 2016 the IUCN moved the giant panda from Endangered to which less serious category?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Vulnerable
After China's wild panda population grew by around 17 percent in a decade thanks to protected reserves and bamboo forest recovery, the IUCN downgraded the species to Vulnerable in September 2016.
A London Zoo panda named Chi Chi inspired the WWF logo in 1961, partly because a black and white animal was cheap to print.
Which country is home to around three quarters of the world's wild tigers?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
India
India's 2022 national census counted an estimated 3,682 wild tigers, almost 75 percent of the global total, a recovery driven by the Project Tiger reserve network launched in 1973.
Tigers have lost more than 90 percent of their historic range and are extinct in the wild in countries such as Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam.
When a rhino named Sudan died in Kenya in 2018, he left only two females of which subspecies alive?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Northern white rhino
Sudan, the last male northern white rhino, was put down at Ol Pejeta Conservancy on 19 March 2018, leaving his daughter Najin and granddaughter Fatu as the only surviving members of the subspecies.
Scientists are using frozen sperm and eggs from Fatu to create embryos that could be carried by southern white rhino surrogates.
Which Australian marsupial has been devastated by a contagious facial tumour disease first spotted in 1996?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Tasmanian devil
Devil facial tumour disease is one of very few transmissible cancers, spread when devils bite each other, and it has wiped out most of the population in affected areas, leading the IUCN to list the species as Endangered.
Healthy insurance populations have been bred in zoos and on Maria Island off Tasmania, and some wild devils are now showing resistance.
Which scaly animal is believed to be the most trafficked wild mammal in the world?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Pangolin
Pangolins are poached in huge numbers for their meat and for their keratin scales, used in traditional medicine, and all eight species are listed as threatened by the IUCN.
A pangolin's scales are made of the same material as human fingernails and have no proven medicinal value.
The vaquita, the world's most endangered marine mammal, lives only in which body of water?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Gulf of California
The vaquita, a tiny porpoise, survives only in the upper Gulf of California in Mexico, where a 2024 survey found as few as six to eight individuals, mostly killed as bycatch in illegal gillnets.
The gillnets are set for the totoaba, a fish whose swim bladder sells for thousands of dollars in China as a supposed health tonic.
In which year was the bald eagle removed from the United States list of endangered and threatened species?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
2007
The bald eagle was delisted in 2007 after its numbers rebounded from a few hundred nesting pairs in the lower 48 states in the 1960s, helped by the 1972 ban on the pesticide DDT.
DDT built up in the fish eagles ate and made their eggshells so thin that they cracked under the weight of the incubating parent.
Most of the world's mountain gorillas live in which mountain range on the borders of Rwanda, Uganda and DR Congo?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Virunga Mountains
Mountain gorillas live in just two places, the Virunga Mountains and Uganda's Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, and in 2018 the IUCN moved them from Critically Endangered to Endangered as numbers passed 1,000.
Dian Fossey studied the Virunga gorillas for 18 years before she was murdered at her camp in 1985, a story told in Gorillas in the Mist.
Which huge North American bird was down to fewer than 30 individuals in 1987, all of them in captivity, before a breeding programme rebuilt the population?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
California condor
The last wild California condor was captured in April 1987, leaving a total world population of 27 birds in zoos, and captive breeding has since raised the total to more than 500.
Lead poisoning from bullet fragments in carcasses remains the leading cause of death for condors released back into the wild.
Which desert antelope was the first animal to be reclassified from Extinct in the Wild back to Vulnerable, in 2011?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Arabian oryx
The Arabian oryx was hunted to extinction in the wild by 1972, but a captive herd bred from a handful of animals was returned to Oman from 1980, and by 2011 over 1,000 lived wild again.
Early reintroductions used a herd nicknamed the World Herd, assembled at Phoenix Zoo in Arizona in the 1960s.
Which flightless, nocturnal New Zealand parrot was down to about 50 birds in 1995 and is now so closely managed that nearly every individual has a name?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Kākāpō
The kākāpō is the world's only flightless parrot, and when New Zealand's recovery programme began in 1995 just 51 were known; they now live on predator free islands and each carries a radio transmitter.
Kākāpō breed only in years when the rimu tree fruits heavily, so some seasons produce no chicks at all.
Which critically endangered big cat survives only in the forests of the Russian Far East and neighbouring northeast China?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Amur leopard
The Amur leopard is among the rarest big cats on Earth, with the IUCN estimating around 130 adults in 2023 across the Primorye region of Russia and the Chinese border forests, up from fewer than 30 in 2007.
Russia created the Land of the Leopard National Park in 2012 to protect the species' core breeding range.
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All Science quizzes →About the Endangered Animals Quiz
Only two northern white rhinos are left alive, both female, while the vaquita porpoise is down to perhaps ten animals in a single Mexican gulf. Yet there is good news too: the giant panda was moved off the endangered list in 2016, the bald eagle soared back from DDT, and the Arabian oryx became the first animal ever to return from extinct in the wild.
These 15 questions cover the IUCN Red List, the most trafficked mammal on Earth, famous extinctions like the dodo, and the species that conservationists pulled back from the brink. Every status and figure is dated so the answers stay accurate. Great for nature lovers, students and anyone who watches wildlife documentaries.
You will find 15 multiple choice questions here, each with four options. Difficulty: Medium. Most people finish in about 6 minutes, and every answer comes with a short explanation and one extra fact worth keeping.
How to play
Read the question and pick one of the four answers. The correct answer is revealed straight away with a short explanation, then press Next question to keep going. At the end you get your score out of 15 and a full review of your round. Play again any time and the questions arrive in a fresh order. There is no timer and no account.
Good to know before you play
How hard is the Endangered Animals Quiz?
It is rated Medium. It opens with the Red List, polar bears and the dodo, then moves into specific species, population figures and conservation success stories.
Are the conservation statuses up to date?
Yes. Each question quotes the IUCN Red List status and ties any population figure to a specific year, so the facts remain correct even as numbers change.
Which animals feature in the quiz?
Giant pandas, tigers, northern white rhinos, Tasmanian devils, pangolins, vaquitas, bald eagles, mountain gorillas, California condors, Arabian oryx, kākāpō and Amur leopards.
Answer key: all 15 questions with explanations
- Which organisation publishes the Red List of Threatened Species, the global ranking of how close each species is to extinction?
IUCN The International Union for Conservation of Nature has published the Red List since 1964, placing species in categories from Least Concern through Vulnerable, Endangered and Critically Endangered to Extinct. The Red List now assesses more than 150,000 species, and over a quarter of them are classed as threatened with extinction. - Which Arctic animal is listed as Vulnerable mainly because climate change is shrinking the sea ice it hunts from?
Polar bear Polar bears depend on sea ice to hunt seals, and the IUCN lists them as Vulnerable because the ice is forming later and melting earlier each year, forcing bears to fast for longer. The global polar bear population is estimated at roughly 22,000 to 31,000 animals spread across 19 subpopulations. - The dodo, hunted to extinction in the 17th century, lived only on which island?
Mauritius The flightless dodo was found only on Mauritius in the Indian Ocean, and within a century of Dutch sailors arriving in 1598 it had been wiped out by hunting and introduced rats, pigs and monkeys. No complete dodo skeleton from a single bird exists, and the last stuffed specimen was thrown out by an Oxford museum in 1755. - In 2016 the IUCN moved the giant panda from Endangered to which less serious category?
Vulnerable After China's wild panda population grew by around 17 percent in a decade thanks to protected reserves and bamboo forest recovery, the IUCN downgraded the species to Vulnerable in September 2016. A London Zoo panda named Chi Chi inspired the WWF logo in 1961, partly because a black and white animal was cheap to print. - Which country is home to around three quarters of the world's wild tigers?
India India's 2022 national census counted an estimated 3,682 wild tigers, almost 75 percent of the global total, a recovery driven by the Project Tiger reserve network launched in 1973. Tigers have lost more than 90 percent of their historic range and are extinct in the wild in countries such as Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. - When a rhino named Sudan died in Kenya in 2018, he left only two females of which subspecies alive?
Northern white rhino Sudan, the last male northern white rhino, was put down at Ol Pejeta Conservancy on 19 March 2018, leaving his daughter Najin and granddaughter Fatu as the only surviving members of the subspecies. Scientists are using frozen sperm and eggs from Fatu to create embryos that could be carried by southern white rhino surrogates. - Which Australian marsupial has been devastated by a contagious facial tumour disease first spotted in 1996?
Tasmanian devil Devil facial tumour disease is one of very few transmissible cancers, spread when devils bite each other, and it has wiped out most of the population in affected areas, leading the IUCN to list the species as Endangered. Healthy insurance populations have been bred in zoos and on Maria Island off Tasmania, and some wild devils are now showing resistance. - Which scaly animal is believed to be the most trafficked wild mammal in the world?
Pangolin Pangolins are poached in huge numbers for their meat and for their keratin scales, used in traditional medicine, and all eight species are listed as threatened by the IUCN. A pangolin's scales are made of the same material as human fingernails and have no proven medicinal value. - The vaquita, the world's most endangered marine mammal, lives only in which body of water?
Gulf of California The vaquita, a tiny porpoise, survives only in the upper Gulf of California in Mexico, where a 2024 survey found as few as six to eight individuals, mostly killed as bycatch in illegal gillnets. The gillnets are set for the totoaba, a fish whose swim bladder sells for thousands of dollars in China as a supposed health tonic. - In which year was the bald eagle removed from the United States list of endangered and threatened species?
2007 The bald eagle was delisted in 2007 after its numbers rebounded from a few hundred nesting pairs in the lower 48 states in the 1960s, helped by the 1972 ban on the pesticide DDT. DDT built up in the fish eagles ate and made their eggshells so thin that they cracked under the weight of the incubating parent. - Most of the world's mountain gorillas live in which mountain range on the borders of Rwanda, Uganda and DR Congo?
Virunga Mountains Mountain gorillas live in just two places, the Virunga Mountains and Uganda's Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, and in 2018 the IUCN moved them from Critically Endangered to Endangered as numbers passed 1,000. Dian Fossey studied the Virunga gorillas for 18 years before she was murdered at her camp in 1985, a story told in Gorillas in the Mist. - Which huge North American bird was down to fewer than 30 individuals in 1987, all of them in captivity, before a breeding programme rebuilt the population?
California condor The last wild California condor was captured in April 1987, leaving a total world population of 27 birds in zoos, and captive breeding has since raised the total to more than 500. Lead poisoning from bullet fragments in carcasses remains the leading cause of death for condors released back into the wild. - Which desert antelope was the first animal to be reclassified from Extinct in the Wild back to Vulnerable, in 2011?
Arabian oryx The Arabian oryx was hunted to extinction in the wild by 1972, but a captive herd bred from a handful of animals was returned to Oman from 1980, and by 2011 over 1,000 lived wild again. Early reintroductions used a herd nicknamed the World Herd, assembled at Phoenix Zoo in Arizona in the 1960s. - Which flightless, nocturnal New Zealand parrot was down to about 50 birds in 1995 and is now so closely managed that nearly every individual has a name?
Kākāpō The kākāpō is the world's only flightless parrot, and when New Zealand's recovery programme began in 1995 just 51 were known; they now live on predator free islands and each carries a radio transmitter. Kākāpō breed only in years when the rimu tree fruits heavily, so some seasons produce no chicks at all. - Which critically endangered big cat survives only in the forests of the Russian Far East and neighbouring northeast China?
Amur leopard The Amur leopard is among the rarest big cats on Earth, with the IUCN estimating around 130 adults in 2023 across the Primorye region of Russia and the Chinese border forests, up from fewer than 30 in 2007. Russia created the Land of the Leopard National Park in 2012 to protect the species' core breeding range.
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