Sources & photo credits

About this guide

A growing, species-first field guide to the wildlife of Bhutan: mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians. This edition lists about 800 species, about 690 of them with photographs.

How the species list was built

The list comes from GBIF occurrence records for Bhutan (retrieved September 2026). A species is included when GBIF holds at least two records for it in Bhutan (mammals and reptiles), five (birds) or one (amphibians). Domestic animals are left out. Scientific names follow the Mammal Diversity Database, the IOC World Bird List and the Reptile Database, and duplicate entries under old and new names have been merged. A few well-documented species with no GBIF records, such as the snow leopard, were added by hand.

Records can include vagrants and misidentifications, so treat rare entries with caution. Common names follow the same lists, then the other Wildlife of Everywhere guides, then Wikipedia; where a species has no English name yet, its scientific name is shown.

Why there is no conservation status

This guide shows only national Red List categories, never global IUCN ones, and we could not find a national Red List covering Bhutan's vertebrates. So no status label is shown. Many species are protected under Bhutan's Forest and Nature Conservation Act.

Reference sources

• GBIF · Bhutan: occurrence records behind the species list
• Mammal Diversity Database: mammal names and taxonomy (CC BY 4.0)
• IOC World Bird List: bird names and taxonomy
• The Reptile Database: reptile taxonomy (via Catalogue of Life, CC BY 4.0)
• Department of Forests and Park Services: protected areas and wildlife law

Planning a visit

Visitors to Bhutan (other than from India, Bangladesh and the Maldives) travel with a licensed Bhutanese guide and pay a daily Sustainable Development Fee; treks and some parks need extra permits. These rules change, so check with the Department of Tourism or a licensed operator before you book rather than relying on the details here.

Wildlife sightings are never guaranteed. The species listed for each place are what is realistically possible there, not what you should expect on a given day.

Your plans and sightings

Your trip plan and sightings are saved in this browser, on this device only. We never see them. Clearing your browser data will clear them too, so download the PDF if you want a copy to keep. Email buttons open a draft in your mail app; nothing is sent until you send it.

Photo credits

Photographs come from iNaturalist and Wikimedia Commons under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA licences, or were taken by the Wildlife of Everywhere team. Each one keeps its photographer's name, licence and a link to the original.

Photographs are chosen to show the species clearly, so many were taken elsewhere in its range rather than in Bhutan. Tap the i on any photograph to see who took it. The full list is below.

View all photo credits