Mediterranean faces crisis of conservation

       One-sixth of Mediterranean mammal species are threatened with extinction at regional level, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) said yesterday.
       The IUCN study released in Malaga assessed the status of 320 mammals,excluding whales and dolphins.
       Threats to mammals include agriculture, hunting, trapping and competition from invasive species.
       Rodents, bats, shrews, hedgehogs and moles are increasingly threatened by the loss or degradation of their habitat from agriculture, pollution, climate change and urbanisation, it said.
       Large herbivores, such as deer,carnivores and rabbits, are particularly vulnerable. The Mediterranean monk seal and the Iberian lynx are critically endangered. Several species have already become extinct in the region, including the Mesopotamian fallow deer and the common hippopotamus.