- Climate change
- Ecosystem services
- Ecosystems and habitats
- Fragmentation
- Genetic resources
- Green infrastructure
- Invasive species
- LIFE+ Nature and Biodiversity Projects
- Land use change
- Overexploitation
- Pollution
- Protected areas
- SEBI - Streamlining European Biodiversity Indicators
- Species
- Tipping points
Mammals
Mammals are a well-known class of vertebrates, including many familiar domesticated species. All mammals are warm-blooded, and all female mammals possess mammary glands (mammae), which are used to suckle the young with milk. The vast majority of mammals give birth to live young. Mammals are found in a wide variety of habitats, including terrestrial, freshwater, and marine systems. They occur from the deserts to the dense forests, from the deep seas to the highest mountains, and from the tropics to the polar ice caps.
Terrestrial mammals native to Europe are even-toed, ungulates, carnivores, bats, hedgehogs and their relatives, rabbits, hares and pikas, rodents, shrews and moles. The marine ones are whales and dolphins, seals and walrus.
The mammal fauna of Europe is largely derived from the Eurasian and African biogeographic zones and therefore exhibits relatively low levels of endemism, as most species tend to have very wide ranges. Within Europe, there are 219 terrestrial mammal species, of which 59 species (26.9%) are endemic, and 41 species of marine mammal, of which none are endemic.
Nearly one in six terrestrial mammal species (15%) are threatened and a further 9% are close to reach the status threatened. A higher proportion of marine mammals are threatened than terrestrial mammals and more than a quarter (27%) of European mammals have declining populations. A quarter (25%) of marine mammals are threatened.
Terrestrial mammal biodiversity is greatest in south-eastern Europen in the mountainous regions of Mediterranean and temperate Europe.
Habitat loss and degradation is the greatest threat to terrestrial mammals, followed by human disturbance, pollution, accidental mortality, overexploitation and invasive spreis. The main threat to marine mammals are accidental mortality (e.g. fisheries bycatch), pollution and overexploitation. (IUCN 2009)
115 mammals (thereof 27 are endemics) are identified as of European interest and therefore covered by the Habitats Directive. The conservation status of these species has been assessed as unfavourable for 40% of the cases; for 46% the conservation status is unknown.
Selected links
