An island in deep ocean is an evolutionary experiment. Cut off from the continents for millions of years, the few plants and animals that reached Madeira — on the wind, on ocean currents, on the feet of birds — diversified in isolation into forms found nowhere else on Earth. The result is a concentration of endemic species remarkable for so small a place.
Birds
Madeira’s birds are its evolutionary headline.
- The Trocaz pigeon (Columba trocaz), a large slate-grey wood pigeon, is found only on Madeira and lives almost entirely within the laurisilva, on whose fruit it depends. Once hunted to scarcity, it has recovered with the forest’s protection.
- Zino’s petrel (Pterodroma madeira) is the rarest seabird in Europe and one of the rarest in the world, with only a few dozen breeding pairs nesting in burrows on the high crags around Pico Ruivo. Rediscovered breeding in 1969 after being thought possibly extinct, it has become a flagship for island conservation.
- The Madeira firecrest (Regulus madeirensis), a tiny, jewel-bright relative of the goldcrest, flits through the forest understorey.
Reptiles and the monk seal
The only land reptile native to the island is the Madeiran wall lizard (Teira dugesii), an endearing and ubiquitous creature that basks on every wall, terrace and café table and has adapted to nibble fruit and even flowers.
Offshore, the Desertas Islands shelter one of the last colonies of the Mediterranean monk seal (Monachus monachus), among the most endangered marine mammals on the planet. Strict protection of the Desertas reserve has allowed the Madeiran population slowly to grow.
Plants
Madeira counts well over a hundred endemic plant species. Among the most loved:
- Pride of Madeira (Echium candicans) — towering blue flower-spikes that blaze across the cliffs in spring.
- Madeira cranesbill (Geranium maderense) — a giant pink-flowered geranium.
- Disa orchid and other endemic orchids of the laurel forest.
- Endemic survivors of the laurisilva canopy itself — til, vinhático, barbusano.
These, together with the island’s spectacular gardens, are why Madeira is so often called a botanist’s paradise. (More on the island’s gardens →)
Invertebrates and the unseen island
Less visible but no less extraordinary is the island’s invertebrate fauna — hundreds of endemic snails, beetles, spiders and other creatures, including many that have lost the power of flight, a classic island adaptation. Some of Madeira’s land snails are known only from single valleys, and a number are sadly already extinct, lost with the lowland forest in the early centuries of settlement.
Conservation
Most of this endemic life is now safeguarded within the Madeira Natural Park and a network of marine protected areas. The chief threats are familiar island ones: introduced predators such as rats and cats, invasive plants crowding out natives, and habitat loss. The recovery of the Trocaz pigeon, the monk seal and Zino’s petrel shows what protection can achieve — and how narrow the margins remain.
See also
- The Laurisilva Madeira's laurisilva is the largest surviving area of laurel forest on Earth — a relic of the subtropical woodland that once covered southern Europe, protected as a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1999.
- The Madeira Archipelago Beyond the main island lie golden-sanded Porto Santo, the wild uninhabited Desertas, and the remote Selvagens far to the south — together making up the Madeira archipelago within wider Macaronesia.
- Pico Ruivo & the Central Peaks At 1,862 metres, Pico Ruivo is Madeira's highest summit — the crown of a central massif of jagged peaks that includes Pico do Areeiro and Pico das Torres, linked by the island's most celebrated mountain trail.