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The fauna of the State of Louisiana is characterized by the region’s low swamplands, bayous, creeks, woodlands, coastal marshlands and beaches, and barrier islands covering an estimated 20,000 square miles (counting for 40 percent of Louisiana's total land area). Southern Louisiana contains up to fifty percent of the wetlands found in the Continental United States, and are made up of countless bayous and creeks. The Creole State has a humid subtropical climate, perhaps the best example of a humid subtropical climate of all the Southern United States with long, humid and hot summers and short, mild winters. The subtropical characteristics of the state are due in large part to the influence of the Gulf of Mexico, which at its farthest point is no more than 200 miles away. Louisiana's varied habitats — tidal marshes, bayous, swamps, woodlands, islands, forests, and prairies — offer a diversity of wildlife. Some of the most common animals found throughout all of the parishes include otter, deer, mink, muskrat, raccoons, opossums, rabbits, squirrels, nutria, turtles, alligators, woodcocks, skunks, foxes, beavers, civet cats, armadillos, coyotes and bobcats. Deer, squirrel, rabbit, and bear are hunted as game, while muskrat, snakes, nutria, mink, opossum, bobcat, and skunk are commercially significant for fur. Prized game birds include quail, turkey, woodcock, and various waterfowl, of which the mottled duck and wood duck are native. There are several endemic plants and animals in Louisiana that are found nowhere else on Earth; an example could be the Louisiana bluestar or the white leucistic alligator.〔http://www.auduboninstitute.org/animals/louisiana-swamp-gallery/spots-white-alligator-3033〕 The Pearl river map turtle and the Ringed map turtle are only found in Louisiana and neighboring State of Mississippi. Louisiana contains a number of areas which are, in varying degrees, protected from human intervention. In addition to National Park Service sites and areas and the Kisatchie National Forest, Louisiana operates a system of state parks, state historic sites, one state preservation area, one state forest, and many Wildlife Management Areas. The Nature Conservancy also owns and manages a set of natural areas. == State ecology == Much of the state's lands were formed from sediment washed down the Mississippi River, leaving enormous deltas and vast areas of coastal marsh and swamp. The northern parts of Louisiana mostly consist of woodlands which are home to deer, squirrels, rabbits, bears, muskrats, mink, opossums, bobcats, and skunks. Louisiana's forests offer a mix of oak, pine, beech, black walnut, and cypress trees. In the Piney Woods in the Ark-La-Tex-region, animals such as the North American cougar, gray fox, western cottonmouth, feral hogs (razorback), the western worm snake, the Louisiana pine snake and other snakes are common.〔http://www.wlf.louisiana.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/publication/32954-feral-hogs/feral_hogs.pdf〕 Louisiana’s largest forest, the Kisatchie National Forest in the forested hills of Central Louisiana, has 155 species of breeding birds, 48 mammal species, 56 reptile species and 30 amphibian species. It is some 600,000 acres in area, more than half of which is vital flatwoods vegetation, which supports many rare plant and animal species. These include for instance the Louisiana pine snake, the red-cockaded woodpecker, the Louisiana black bear and the Louisiana pearlshell.〔United States Department of Agriculture. 1999. Final Environmental Impact Statement. Revised Land and Resource Management Plan. Kisatchie National Forest. Forest Service, Southern Region, Pineville, LA.〕 Alligators are common in Louisiana's extensive swamps, bogs, creeks, lakes, rivers, wetlands, and bayous. Other water-loving reptiles such as the alligator snapping turtle live in the Louisiana swamps. The alligator snapping turtle is characterized by a very large head and three rows of spiked scutes. These wetlands of Louisiana make ideal homes for several species of turtles, crawfish and catfish - all of which are popular Acadian foods. Jambalaya; a Louisiana Creole dish that originated among the Cajuns in Acadiana, is made entirely by all sorts of meat found in the swampland of southern Louisiana: crawfish, herons, shellfish, catfish, toads, frogs, shrimp, oysters, alligator, duck, turtle, boar, venison, and myriad other species. Among invasive species that thrive in the wetlands of Louisiana is the nutria, a South American rodent that was likely introduced when individual animals escaped from fur farms. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Fauna of Louisiana」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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