State of Nature 2024 - Land Mammals
Our Island currently supports ten species of wild mammal: Irish stoat (known locally as weasels), ferret (polecat), hedgehog, woodmouse/long-tailed fieldmouse, housemouse, mountain hare, brown hair, rabbit, pigmy shrew and longtails (R.A.T.s). Although there is some debate over the ethnicity of some of these species, such as hedgehogs which are believed to have originally arrived on the Calf of Man as pets aboard a wrecked ship, they are all considered well-established if not native species. (We have no squirrels, badgers or foxes on the Island.)