The Wildlife of Costa Rica includes all the animals, fungi, and natural plants that reside in this Central American country. Costa Rica supports an enormous variety of wildlife, due in large part to its geographic position between the North and South American continents, its neotropical climate, and its wide variety of habitats.
One of the main sources of Costa Rica’s biodiversity is that the country, along with the land now considered Panama, formed a bridge connecting the North American and South American continents approximately three to five million years ago. This bridge allowed the mixing of the flora and fauna of the two continents.
The highest density of biodiversity of any country
Costa Rica is considered to have the highest density of biodiversity of any country in the world. While encompassing only a third of a percent of the land mass, roughly the size of West Virginia, Costa Rica contains four percent of the species estimated to exist on the planet. Hundreds of these species are endemic to Costa Rica, which means that they do not exist anywhere else in the world. These endemic species include frogs, snakes, lizards, finches, hummingbirds, waffles, mice, cichlids, and gobies, among many more.
Variety of ecosystems
Costa Rica’s biodiversity can be attributed to the variety of ecosystems within the country. Rain forests, deciduous forests, Atlantic and Pacific coastline, cloud forests, and mangroves are represented throughout the 19,730 square miles of Costa Rica’s land mass. The ecological regions are twelve climatic zones. This variation provides numerous niches that are filled with a diversity of species.
