Wildlife of
São Paulo

Primary Threats

• Habitat loss and breaking up happen in interior plateaus and agro-industrial areas, leaving the Atlantic Forest in small, isolated patches with strong edge effects. On the coast, Serra do Mar and Ribeira Valley still have larger blocks, but lowland clearing and settlement threaten coastal scrub and mangroves.
• Urban and peri-urban expansion across the São Paulo Macrometropolis (Greater São Paulo-Campinas-Sorocaba-Paraíba Valley-Baixada Santista) advances into water-supply catchments, slopes, and protected-area buffer zones, increasing soil sealing, heat islands, sedimentation, and water demand.
• Highways (e.g., Anchieta-Imigrantes system, Presidente Dutra, Régis Bittencourt) and associated works (pipelines, power lines) cut through remnants, increasing wildlife roadkill, genetic isolation, and inducing edge settlement. Ports and port-adjacent industrial areas (Santos and São Sebastião) intensify pressure on estuaries and coastal scrub.
• Diffuse and point-source pollution affects rivers and estuaries: sewage loads and industrial effluents in urban/metropolitan reaches (Tietê/Pinheiros basins and tributaries), contamination by agrochemicals in agricultural areas, and pressure on coastal estuaries from waste, dredging, and port activity.
• Sugarcane, citrus, plantation forestry, and cattle production in the interior compete with restoring and maintaining protected riparian areas and legal reserves, further fragmenting remaining habitats. Landscape simplification reduces habitat for forest birds and medium/large mammals.
• Channelization, straightening, dams, and water withdrawals for supply and energy alter hydrological regimes and aquatic connectivity, affecting migratory fish, wetlands, and riparian habitat quality; on the coast, estuary engineering and dredging change sediment dynamics.
• More frequent climate extremes (heat waves, droughts, intense rainfall) increase fire risk in drier interior fragments, stress water sources used by the macrometropolis, and alter slope dynamics in the Serra do Mar (landslides), while pressuring species restricted to specific altitudes and microclimates.
• Non-native and invasive species compete with and alter ecosystems: African grasses along edges and open areas increase flammability; pines and other species can invade grasslands and coastal scrub; in aquatic environments, introduced species (e.g., tilapias) affect native communities.
• Epizootics such as sylvatic yellow fever impact primates (especially howler monkeys, Alouatta spp.) in Atlantic Forest areas and mosaics near urban centers, reducing populations and altering ecological dynamics; proximity to urban areas also increases pathogen risks and interactions with domestic animals.
• Subsistence and opportunistic hunting still occurs in regions with larger remnants (e.g., the Ribeira Valley and parts of the interior), strongly affecting large mammals (white-lipped peccaries, collared peccaries, pacas) and undermining processes such as seed dispersal.
• Wildlife trafficking (especially songbirds) and illegal keeping of wild animals persist, with demand concentrated in large urban centers; this reduces local populations and incentivizes capture in accessible remnants of the interior and coast.
• Along the coast and in estuaries (Baixada Santista and the Cananéia-Iguape complex), fishing pressure and destructive practices can reduce stocks and increase juvenile catch, interacting with habitat degradation (mangroves/estuaries) and affecting coastal species and connected inland waters.
• Tourism, irregular settlement, and intensive recreation at beaches, trails, and waterfalls (Serra do Mar, northern and southern coasts) increase litter, noise, trampling of coastal vegetation, and wildlife disturbance, and can facilitate fires and the introduction of non-native species.
• Conflicts with carnivores (pumas and, more rarely, jaguars) include predation on domestic animals at protected-area edges (Serra do Mar/Ribeira Valley and inland mosaics), leading to retaliation and hunting; in urban areas, synanthropic wildlife and roadkill increase.
• Intense fragmentation in the interior creates small, isolated populations with risks of inbreeding and loss of genetic diversity-especially critical for forest species with limited dispersal among fragments and for primates dependent on continuous canopy.
• High water demand for urban supply and industry in the macrometropolis pressures water sources and increases withdrawals and transfers, reducing ecological flows during dry periods and affecting the integrity of aquatic and riparian ecosystems.
• Although legal deforestation is more restricted in the Atlantic Forest, illegal extraction and forest degradation still occur in fragments (including selective logging and harvesting of juçara palm), reducing habitat structure and food resources for wildlife.
• Mining (sand, crushed stone, and other materials) and extraction in sensitive areas cause vegetation removal, alteration of waterways, dust/noise, and heavy traffic; in coastal zones and sedimentary basins this can worsen sedimentation and turbidity.