Anthropochorous wild mamma taxa and conservation list

As early as 10,000 years ago, humans have played an often unrecognized role in dispersing many mammal species in islands around the world. Early taxonomist described those isolated and sometimes morphologically distinctive mammals as 'species' and 'subspecies'which are often included in national and international Red Lists. If the origin of such 'taxa' is not taken into account in conservation inventories the risk are to direct funding opportunities towards populations of artificial origin and of negligible evolutionary importance, and inadvertently protect one of the historic causes of biodiversity loss on islands. In the Mediterranean islands almost all endemic mammal species went extinct (with a very few exceptions) following human arrival and new species were introduced. As we find similar cases in other parts of the world, we suggest that mammalian nominal taxa of proven artificial origin should be listed separately in conservation lists.