Largest organisms one of the largest and oldest clonal colonies on Earth. Among animals, the largest species are all marine mammals, specifically whales. The blue whale is believed to be the largest animal to have ever lived. The largest land animal classification is also dominated by mammals, with the African bush elephant being the most massive of these. The largest single-stem tree by wood volume and mass is the giant sequoia ("Sequoiadendron giganteum"), native to Sierra Nevada and California; it typically grows to a height of and in diameter. Multiple-stem trees such as banyan can be enormous. Thimmamma Marrimanu in India spreads
Largest prehistoric animals monotreme (egg-laying mammal) ever was the extinct long-beaked echidna species known as "Zaglossus hacketti", known from a couple of bones found in Western Australia. It was the size of a sheep, weighing probably up to . The largest cingulate known is "Doedicurus", at long and reaching a mass of approximately "Glyptodon" easily topped and . The largest-known animal of this group was "Deinogalerix", measuring up to in total length, with a skull up to long. It occupied the same ecological niche as dogs and cats today. The largest-known prehistoric lagomorph is Minorcan giant lagomorph ("Nuralagus rex") at . The largest-known