A new study led by Adrián García-Rodríguez and involving several BioInvasions team members was recently published in Nature Communications. The research synthesizes large-scale data on alien vertebrates in the world’s mountains, analyzing their distribution patterns, realm flows, presence in protected areas, and the drivers behind these trends.
The study is the first focusing on these taxa and biologically relevant geographic regions, documenting over 700 alien vertebrate species across nearly 3000 mountains. The results show that birds and mammals are the most reported groups and highlights that mountains in the Palearctic and Nearctic are the primary recipients, while species mainly originate from the Nearctic, Indo-Malay, and Afrotropical regions. Alarmingly, a significant proportion of alien vertebrate species are found in protected areas. The research also identifies correlations between anthropogenic impacts, physical mountain characteristics, and the increasing presence of alien vertebrates in mountains of the world. Overall, this large-scale assessment reveals the advance of alien vertebrates in mountains worldwide and urges attention to minimize the impacts of biological invasions on the exceptional mountain biotas.
For more details, you can read the article here.
Reference:
García-Rodríguez, A., Lenzner, B., Velasco, J.A., Schertler, A., Omer, A., Seebens, H., Capinha, C., Gallardo, B., Dullinger, S., & Essl, F., (2025) The global distribution patterns of alien vertebrate richness in mountains. Nature Communications 16, 1977. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-57214-w
