TERRESTRIAL FAUNA

The terrestrial fauna is home to vertebrate species (birds, lizards and mammals) and a great variety of invertebrates, many of which are endemic.

ARTHROPODS

Arthropods dominate and present the greatest diversity, with around 769 taxa and also the highest number of endemisms, 201, of which 64 are exclusive to Porto Santo, 88 to Madeira and 49 to Macaronesia.

Relative to insects, there are 675 taxa (52 endemic to Porto Santo), the most abundant being beetles (274 taxa), followed by butterflies and moths (137 taxa).

REPTILES

Two taxa are identified in the reptile class, one endemic to Porto Santo, the Madeiran wall lizard (Teira dugesii jogeri).

MARINE FAUNA

Its ichthyologic fauna (demersal fish) is like the other islands of the archipelago, both in species variety and in biological diversity.

Amongst species of fishery interest up to 100m deep, the following are abundant: snapper (Pagrus pagrus), grouper (Serranus atricauda), stingray (Phycis phycis), offshore rockfish (Pontinus kuhlii), bream (Diplodus sargus), two-banded sea bream (Diplodus vulgaris), grey triggerfish (Balistes capriscus), rockhopper (Sparisoma cretense), dogfish (Bodianus scrofa), scorpionfish (Scorpaena scrofa), sea bass (Pagellus bogaraveo), turbot ( Polyprion americanus), white trevally (Pseudocaranx dentex), the amberjacks (Seriola spp.) and the Azores chromis (Chromis limbata).

Relatively abundant are Mediterranean moray (Muraena helena), conger (Conger conger), brown moray (Gymnothorax spp.), rays (Raja spp.) and stingray (Dasyatis spp.).

In addition to this fauna, several species of cetaceans are present, such as the bottle-nose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus), also listed in Annex II of that directive and others listed in Annex IV such as the short-beaked common dolphin (Delphinus delphis), the Atlantic spotted dolphin (Stenella frontalis) and the sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus).