Ghost Animals: Creatures of the Spooky Season

You may be surprised to learn that ghosts are everywhere in the world.

Not the spirits of dead people lingering after their bodies have disappeared, but an array of pale, stealthy and retiring animal species whose names evoke the elusive phantoms that populate our imaginations.

To mark the spooky season, come and celebrate these uncanny creatures and the remarkable biodiversity of our beautiful, endlessly captivating planet.

Ghost animals on land

Ghost bat (Macroderma gigas)

Ghost bats are Australia’s biggest microbat species and the continent’s sole carnivorous bat. They inhabit caves and disused mine shafts, flying out after dark to feed on insects, frogs, small reptiles, birds and even other small bats. Their formidable jaws can crunch through their prey’s bones.

Although these pale, spectral-looking animals may sound fearsome, their bodies grow to little more than the size of your palm. They are currently classified as a threatened species because mining is destroying and degrading their habitats. That is the real horror.

Ghost crabs (Ocypodinae)

Ghost crabs, on the other hand, are widespread. Found on intertidal beaches across Earth’s tropical and subtropical regions, they scuttle so rapidly that a blink could make you miss them. Usually pale enough to blend into the sand, they are active at night and dart in and out of sight like … well, ghosts.

Their long, conspicuous eyestalks are striking, and they can produce rasping sounds with their claws. They can even grind teeth in their stomachs together to growl at threats. Certain species are also able to change colour to improve their camouflage. Given this impressive collection of survival equipment, perhaps it is no surprise that nature keeps producing crabs.

Ghost moth (Hepialus humuli)

A whole range of moths are informally called 'ghost moths', but the definitive ghost moth among them is Hepialus humuli, which is native across much of Europe. Males are spectral white, while females carry delicate golden patterns. The white males are believed to have inspired the spectral nickname, as white moths are often linked in myth and folklore to the souls of the dead.

Alternatively, the name may come from the males’ unusual courtship display. When they are ready to find a partner, males gather in a group called a lek to perform a seductive dance. They beat their wings and float upwards and downwards while releasing pungent pheromones that are apparently highly alluring, provided you are a moth.

Ghost frogs (Heleophrynidae)

At first sight, ghost frogs of the Heleophrynidae family, which are native to South Africa, do not seem particularly ghostly. Nor is it certain why they are called ghost frogs. Some people suggest the name comes from their presence in Skeleton Gorge, although nobody knows with certainty.

What is known is that they represent the oldest recognised group of 'new' frogs, or Neobatrachia, among every species in that suborder.

They spend most of their lives in fast-flowing streams, using their impressively large, gripping toes to hold on to rocks. Like other amphibians, they emerge to mate beneath a full Moon. Perhaps frogs were the real werewolves all along.

Ghost animals in the ocean

Ghost sharks (Chimaeriformes)

The cold, dark ocean depths are home to many strange, silent beings, but chimaeras may be among the oddest of all. Also called ghost sharks or spookfish, they are not actually sharks. Instead, they are an order of cartilaginous fish closely related to sharks and rays, occurring mainly in deep waters worldwide, apart from polar seas.

Their name is fitting: grooves and dots across their snouts and faces give them an eerie appearance resembling incision scars. Yet they are fairly difficult to encounter, unless you happen to be a crustacean or starfish. In that case, you may end up crushed between a ghost shark’s tooth plates before being eaten.

Those grooves are lateral line canals, which, along with the dots, make up part of a chimaera’s sensory system. Sunlight cannot reach the deep ocean zones inhabited by many of these animals, so they require another way to navigate and locate prey in that permanent darkness.

Ghost octopus (Casper)

This charming little octopus is so uncommon that it has not yet received a formal name. It was found in abyssopelagic waters in 2016, at depths below 4,000 metres, and scientists have been unable to determine where it sits on the octopus family tree because no specimen has ever been collected.

It has informally been called "Casper" because it is cute, pale and translucent, like a friendly lil ghost. A few details about it are known, however. It deposits its eggs on the stalks of dead sea sponges that once grew on manganese nodules on the ocean floor.

It then curls around the clutch to guard the eggs as they incubate. This behaviour is typical of octopuses: the mother will literally die protecting her eggs, silently starving herself to give them the strongest possible chance of survival.

In that sense, every octopus is a ghost: a revenant of its parent’s sacrifice, spreading through the ocean.