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The Wildlife of Costa Rica
The Wildlife of Costa Rica

The Wildlife of Costa Rica comprises all naturally occurring animals, fungi and plants that reside in this Central American country. The area 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. The ecological regions include twelve climatic zones and have tropical rainforests, deciduous forests, Atlantic and Pacific coastline, cloud forests, and mangrove forests which provide numerous niches which are filled by a diversity of species.

While encompassing just one third of a percent of Earth’s landmass, approximately the size of West Virginia, Costa Rica is home to more than 500,000 species, which represents nearly 4% of the total species estimated worldwide, making it one of the 20 countries with the highest biodiversity on the planet. Of these 500,000 species, a little more than 300,000 are insects. One of the principal sources of Costa Rica's biodiversity is that the country, along with the land now considered Panama, formed a bridge connecting the North and South American continents approximately three to five million years ago. This bridge allowed the very different flora and fauna of the two continents to mix.