Fauna of the Faroe Islands
The avian fauna of the Faroes is dominated by seabirds and birds attracted to open land like heather, probably due to the lack of woodland and other suited habitats.
[1] Puffins (Fratercula arctica), razorbills (Alca torda), and guillemots (Uria aalge), are very common seabirds in Faroe.
Black guillemots (Cepphus grylle), eiders (Somateria mollissima) and shag (Phalacrocorax aristotelis) are common around the coast and the fulmars (Fulmarus glacialis) which immigrated to the islands in the 19th century have a steadily growing population.
There are six species of seagulls (Larus) and the storm petrel (Hydrobates pelagicus) colony on Nólsoy is the largest in the world.
faroeensis) is the biggest starling in the world, and is very common in and around human habitation together with house sparrow (Passer domesticus).
This colour variation was unique to the Faroe Islands, and created a high demand for the birds among foreign collectors.
However, a recent study,[3] based on DNA-analyses, has shown that mice on the most remote islands (Hesti, Fugloy, Mykines and Nólsoy) are characterized as M. m. domesticus, whereas the mice on the better connected islands (Sandoy and in Torshavn) are mixed and have both M. m. musculus and M. m. domesticus genetic elements.
The brown rat (Rattus norvegicus) is common in and around human habitations as well as in the outfield, doing big damage in bird colonies.
It reached the Faroe Islands on the Norwegian ship Kongen af Preussen, which wrecked on the Scottish Isle of Lewis.
A recent genomic analyses reveal three independent introductions of the invasive brown rat to the Faroe Islands.
American mink (Mustela vison) have escaped from farms on several occasions, but were caught or shot most of the time, and never managed to establish a stock in the wild.
These are usually hunted down as fast as possible, as they do heavy damage to native bird life and the introduced hare population.
Blue whales can sometimes appear during the months of late April to June, and be seen migrating north through Hestfjørð and Vestmannasund on the southwest side of Streymoy (if the weather cooperates).
Flies, moths, spiders, beetles, slugs, snails, earthworms and other small invertebrates are part of the indigenous fauna of the Faroe Islands.
More recent introductions are the New Zealand flatworm, the Spanish slug, and the common wasp which all have become part of the natural fauna.
