The American mink (Neovison vison) is found in almost all parts of Norway (and in many parts of Europe as well), and has spread from captive fur minks that have escaped their cages

You might expect that the American mink (Neovison vison) is only found in America, but that’s completely wrong. While it was originally native to North-America, export has brought it to most parts of Europe, as well as parts of South-America and Asia. This carnivorous mustelid feeds on rodents, fish, crustaceans, frogs, and its favorite: birds.

An American mink. Image by Wikimedia Commons user Needsmoreritalin, posted with the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.

While the American mink does look very cute and fluffy, it has lots of negative impacts when it enters a new ecosystem in Europe or South-America. Not only does it tend to outcompete European mink (Mustela lutreola), northern water vole (Arvicola amphibious), and Pyrenean desman (Galemys pyrenaicus) which all share the same ecological niche, but it also severely affect certain bird populations in areas where it settles down.

How the American mink ended up in Norway and other parts of Europe

The entire reason why the American minks are in Europe and South-America in the first place is because they are great for fur farming. Apparently their fur is denser, softer, longer and more close-fitting than the fur from the European mink, and it is even the animal that is most frequently farmed for fur.

Keeping smart predators like this one in a small cage eventually leads to some of them escaping, and that is exactly what has happened at several fur farms in different parts of Europe. Enough managed to escape over the years to create a stable population, and they are currently found in many parts of the world!

Image by Flickr user Bjørn Tennøe, posted with the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.

A closer look at the American mink in Norway

Since I’m from Norway, I do have some knowledge about how the American mink affects our ecosystems, so I will focus on Norway for the rest of this post. Almost every part of Norway has the American mink, except for some islands, and the climate here is perfect for the American mink. It has no natural predators (eagles and large mammals have apparently killed some, but they are not actively predating on the American mink), and their high reproductive output has made them a huge treat to the local Norwegian ecosystems.

The American mink in Norway thrives in wetlands and in areas close to lakes and rivers, because this area is perfect for poaching eggs from birds that nest on the ground. The biggest problems comes from areas where it predates on the egg of common eider (Somateria mollissima), black guillemot (Cepphus grylle), and razorbills (Alca torda), which are all birds that we really want to keep in Norway. The American mink does indeed pose a threat to these bird species, and many people fear that it will severely affect their breeding habitats if the minks keep increasing in numbers.

A common wider. Image by Steve Garvie, posted with the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.

How Norway deals with the American mink

Miljødirektoratet (Norwegian Environment Agency) wants to get rid of all the American minks in Norway (source is only partially in English, sorry), and does this by paying hunters who trap and kill them. The also have the Norwegians equivalent of park rangers (Statens Naturoppsyn) do this, with a focus on areas where it predates on eggs of vulnerable birds. There was just an article about a Norwegian hunter who hunted American mink as his full-time job in the national newspaper, and apparently kills enough of them to collect a bounty that is big enough for him to have as his only job.

Thanks for reading

Thanks for reading this short post about how the American mink spread to Europe and South America, where it is currently wreaking havoc on local ecosystems.

I hope this gives you an idea about how important it is to keep invasive species from getting a foothold in new regions, and if you are still on the fence, check out how the red fox did a lot of the same thing in Australia. As for sources, I mainly used this one about the American mink, but it’s all in Norwegian, so not all of you are going to be able to check it out. However, there is plenty of information about the invasion of American mink in Europe available, so just search for it if you want to learn more. It's pretty interesting to learn how a species like this one was used for fur farming and eventually ended up living in the wild in several different places in the world!

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