The fauna of South America consists of a huge variety of unique animals some of which evolved in relative isolation. The isolation of South America had an abrupt end some few million years ago when the Isthmus of Panama was formed allowing small scale migration of animals that would result in the Great American Interchange. The Great American Interchange was an important late Cenozoic paleozoogeographic event in which land and freshwater fauna migrated from North America via Central America to South America and vice versa, as the volcanic Isthmus of Panama rose up from the sea floor and bridged the formerly separated continents. After the late Mesozoic breakup of Gondwana, South America spent most of the Cenozoic era as an island continent whose "splendid isolation" allowed its fauna to evolve into many forms found nowhere else on Earth.
This fun learning game may answer some of the following questions:
- What animals live in South America?
- Which are the animals of South America?
- Where do flamingos live?