Whether they escaped from zoos or
accompanied migrating nomads, invasive species from giant Himalayan
bats and porcupines to house mice now account for 22 percent of mammals
in Europe, a new study finds.
If bats and marine mammals are excluded,
the researchers found aliens make up some 28 percent of terrestrial
mammals in Europe.
Yet despite growing awareness of the
economic and ecologic costs of invasive
species, the number of alien mammals across Europe continues to rise, the
researchers report.
"These findings confirm that invasions
are still increasing, with no sign of a saturation effect," lead
author Piero Genovesi, a senior scientist at the Institute for
Environmental Protection and Research in Rome, Italy, said in an email
interview. The research is detailed in the September issue of the journal
Integrative Zoology.
The study will help conservation agencies
prevent new invaders, Genovesi told LiveScience.
"Introductions of animals carried by people, sometimes accidentally,
sometimes intentionally, are a severe and growing
threat to biodiversity, requiring urgent action, he said. "The data
can be used to detect the main pathways of introductions."
Reports of aliens
As predators, mammals have played an
out-size role in past
extinctions — for instance, rats have caused 40-60 percent of all
seabird and reptile extinctions. "Mammals are one of the most — if not the
most — harmful group of invasives," said Genovesi, chair of
the Invasive Species Specialist Groupin Valby, Denmark, part of the
International Union for Conservation of Nature.
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