Animals in German

Animal genders have to be learned one by one — der Hund, die Katze, das Pferd — and the general word often differs from the male or female one: die Katze, but der Kater for a tomcat. Diminutives in -chen are always neuter, which is why the squirrel is das Eichhörnchen. Of these 34 words, 3 are among the 5,000 most common; the other 31 are basic words, marked with a dash.