Introduction to Species

The BC portion of the Columbia River Basin, with its diverse landscapes, provides habitat for the majority of BC terrestrial species. A total of 447 terrestrial vertebrate species are known to occur in the BC basin. Of this total, 437 species occur in both the BC and US portions of the basin, and 10 species occur only in BC.

For all species combined, the BC basin´s species richness accounts for 74% and 56% of all BC and Canadian terrestrial vertebrate species, respectively.  To further emphasize the biological importance of the BC Columbia Basin, the region represents 61% of all birds and 56% of all terrestrial mammals in Canada.

Almost 20% (84 species) of terrestrial species in the database are currently red- or blue-listed species.  These species represent over 50% of all listed terrestrial vertebrate species in the province, 10% of species listed in the Identified Wildlife Management Strategy of the BC Forest Practices Code, and 6% of species listed by the federal Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC). The status of each species is listed in the table BC_Lifehistory_GeneralStatus&Occurrence in the downloadable MS Access database.