Genesis 1:24-25

24 And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. 25 And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

In this pair of verses, God said, "Let the earth bring forth", this does NOT take away from Gods creations, the earth did not produce animals over a period of millions of years, the framework of the day, evening and morning still frame the days of the week of creation. It is also noted here, that all animals with the exception of the birds and the fish were created from the earth and not from the waters.  I think it is also interesting to compare the meats we eat from the animals, those which came from the water, fish and fowl are white meat, while the legged animals we eat are a red meat.

It should also be noted that God did not require or have need of the earth to create living beings, but I believe since he knew of the fall of man before the fact, since John later acknowledges that the plan of salvation through Jesus was established before the foundation of the earth, that it only made sense for God to create living creatures from the material to which they must return.

I also would like to make a point here in favor of creation vs evolution, that all the animals were created as seperate species, and that the plan was put in place that they should reproduce after their own kind.  If evolution were a fact it would stand to reason that chaos would almost require flexibility in reproduction, that species could interbreed, and that a variety of life would be much better suited to adaptation and creative growth of newer more successful species.  This is not the case, each specie has the ability to adapt to it's environment but they must replicate after their own kind.  We now know that genetics and reproduction are almost like copying a movie, (of course no one does that), the point being that information is replicated within the given donors contribution.  Most if not all genetic defects which evolutionists rely upon as proof of evolution are a loss or a flaw in the genetic replication and are not added segments of genetic language used for the purpose of bettering the specie.

Aside from all this, there is also the miracle here of Gods providence that a lifeless substance such as the earth, suddenly is capable of bringing forth life.  Not only is this unexplainable within the realm of evolutionary science, but in our highest levels of science today we can put together all the ingredients that make life, but we cannot give it life. The presence of life itself is perhaps an unexplainable enigma.