[4] Abijatta-Shalla National Park is home to 76 species of mammals which includes Grant's gazelles, bohor reedbucks, oribis, common warthogs, greater kudus, caracals, honey badgers, colobus monkeys, aardvarks, spotted hyenas, greater kudus, klipspringers, porcupines, olive baboons, and black-backed jackals.

[5] Other species that were abundant in Abijatta-Shalla National Park, such as lions, giraffes, waterbucks, buffalos, and Swayne's hartebeests, were locally extirpated due to hunting or possibly habitat loss.

Other mammalian species that are endemic to this park include Scott’s hairy bat (Nyotis scotti), white-toothed shrew (Crocidura phaeura), Mahomet mouse (Mus mahomet), Ethiopian white-footed mouse (Stenocephalemys albipes), Abyssinian grass rat (Arvicanthis abyssinicus), and Harrington's rat (Desmomys harringtoni).

Great white pelicans only settled on Lake Shalla which also serves as both a breeding site and a feeding ground along with several species of storks, herons, egrets, plovers, and cormorants.

During the tumultuous period of the last days of the Derg regime, and for some time afterward, large numbers of nomads took advantage of weakened central authority to move into the Park and set up residence with their livestock.

[8] A recent visitor noted that while viable breeding populations of greater kudu, Grant's gazelle, black-backed jackal, and spotted hyena may exist, he saw no evidence of their presence.