GLOBAL PATTERNS OF MAMMALIAN DIVERSITY, ENDEMISM, AND ENDANGERMENT

To assess the conservation status of the world's land mammals, we comp iled data on the number of total species, endemic species, recently ex tinct species, and currently endangered species for 155 countries. Tot al species richness was significantly correlated with territorial land area, whereas number of endemic species was only weakly correlated wi th both area and total number of species. The large amount of variatio n left unexplained by species-area regressions reflects the influence of other factors, such as latitude, topographic and habitat heterogene ity, and historical biogeography, on species richness and especially o n patterns of endemism. Countries of particular conservation concern, because they have rich mammalian faunas containing many endemic specie s, are the large islands of Australia Madagascar, Indonesia and the Ph ilippines, as well as continental Mexico. Patterns of recent extinctio ns and the current endangered status of species were difficult to inte rpret, largely because of inadequate and inconsistent data. The majori ty of officially listed endangered species are large, well known, and popular mammals, such as primates, ungulates, and carnivores, whereas the majority of species known to have gone recently extinct and likely to be currently threatened are small and inconspicuous, such as roden ts and bats. Our work not only illustrates the role of ecological, evo lutionary, and biogeographic processes in the origin and maintenance o f land mammal diversity it also presents the information at the level of biogeographic regions and political units where management and poli cy must be applied in order to slow the loss of this diversity.