Fauna

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Fauna is the animal life of a region or a particular time. It includes all the animal species found there, just as flora is the plant life and funga is the fungi. Together, flora, fauna, and fungi make up the biota—the living things in an area.

Origins: The word comes from the Latin name Fauna, a Roman earth goddess, and is related to Faunus and the mythic fauns. Carl Linnaeus popularized the term in his 1745 work Fauna Suecica.

Fauna in science: Zoologists and paleontologists use fauna to refer to the typical collection of animals in a place or era, such as the fauna of the Sonoran Desert or the Burgess Shale fauna. They may also talk about faunal stages, which are rock layers that share similar fossils.

Common subdivisions (by region or habitat)
- Cryofauna: animals that live in very cold areas.
- Cryptofauna: animals that live in hidden or tiny habitats.
- Epifauna: aquatic animals that live on the surface of the seabed or on top of sediments.
- Infauna: animals that live buried in the bottom sediments.
- Limnofauna: animals that live in fresh water.
- Macrofauna: larger animals that can be caught on a sieve (often bigger than 0.5 mm; in deep sea studies, 0.3 mm).
- Megafauna: very large animals in a region or time (e.g., Australian megafauna).
- Meiofauna: small benthic animals that are bigger than microfauna but smaller than macrofauna; they live between sand grains and are defined by size (roughly between 0.5–1 mm mesh and 30–45 μm mesh in practice).
- Mesofauna: medium-sized soil animals such as arthropods and nematodes.
- Microfauna: microscopic animals like protozoa and rotifers.
- Stygofauna: animals living in groundwater systems, such as caves and underground aquifers.
- Troglofauna: cave-dwelling animals adapted to darkness.
- Xenofauna: hypothetical alien animal life.

Other terms you might see
- Avifauna: bird life.
- Piscifauna (ichthyofauna): fish life.

In short, fauna covers all the animals in a place or time, from the largest mammals to tiny microscopic creatures, and scientists use many special terms to describe what lives where and how they live.