Biogeography and Archaeozoology of Island Mammals

Dear Colleagues,

The invasion of ecosystems by exotic taxa is currently viewed as one of the most important causes of the loss of biodiversity. Invasive alien species (IAS) are recognised as one of the major causes of habitat destruction on a global scale, and islands are particularly vulnerable in view of the high proportion of endemic species and the specific biogeographic situation linked to their isolation. The most significant cases of biodiversity loss are usually to be found on islands, where indigenous species have often evolved in the absence of strong trophic competition, parasitism or predation. As a result, the introduced species also thrive in the optimal insular ecosystems that affect their plant food, competitors or animal prey. It is above all on islands that the biological records offer univocal evidence of the appearance of allochthonous species and anthropogenic introductions. The fact is that on islands, the impact of extraneous elements on the unspoilt ecological system can be identified, and its chronology specified with considerable precision, as a result of the evidence left and the relative rapidity of the consequences produced.

To assess the range of the primeval distribution of zoological species on an international scale, earlier chronologies prior to Neolithisation should be considered. After this, the improvement in human seafaring skills and the trade networks set up between various countries enabled the artificial exportation of the animals of kinegetic interest, together with those already involved in the process of domestication. What appears evident is that, starting from the Early Holocene, there began a human colonisation of islands that entailed the massive introduction of continental fauna species, accompanied by the gradual disappearance of the endemic elements. This effectively took place in a diachronic and differentiated form in relation to the various species and the different insular complexes. The Neolithic settlement of islands cannot be explained as the result of a merely casual maritime dispersal of hunter-gatherers, but appears much more plausibly a movement of intentional and planned colonisation. Therefore, it is not simply a question of the transfer of breeding knowledge, but also of the physical transportation of the animals themselves. This ecological and cultural transplantation could not have been the result of casual maritime prospecting, but only the outcome of an expedition, or a series of expeditions, planned and prepared with a specific objective: the colonisation of an island. Man brought with him the animals he needed as economic supplies for the colonisation of new geographical areas, promoting their diffusion by eliminating ecological barriers and by augmenting the anthropogenic environment to be suitable for these species. Similar cases can be found within the Mediterranean basin but also in other insular areas as far apart as Indonesia or French Polynesia. This type of events also occur, or have occurred, in so-called “ecological islands”, which are areas of land, not necessarily real islands, but territories isolated by natural or artificial means from the surrounding land, where a natural micro-habitat exists amidst a larger differing ecosystem.

In view of the vulnerability of most of today's natural ecosystems, it is of fundamental importance to keep the phenomenon of the loss of biodiversity under control and, above all, to avoid further, future introductions. Care must be taken, however, because an excessively philological and “purist” approach to the compilation of the conservation documents may even prove to be detrimental, since the primeval ecosystems of the Mediterranean islands were irretrievably lost thousands of years ago. In the more specific case of the endemic mammals, they are practically entirely extinct.

Prof. Dr. Marco Masseti
Guest Editor

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• mammals
• invasive alien
• biodiversity loss
• habitat destruction
• biogeography
• archaeozoology