Climate Change Will Significantly Increase Impending Bird Extinctions

By 2100, climate change could cause up to 30 percent of land-bird species to go extinct worldwide, if the worst-case scenario comes to pass. read more...

Tags: Birds, Climate Change, Global Warming

Bowerbirds and Climate Change

According to Steve Williams, if temperatures continue to rise in the Australian cloudforests, the bowerbirds and many other species will be threatened with extinction. Read More...

Photo courtesy of www.cassowarytours.com.au

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Good links about birds and climate change

An interesting set of links from The Bluebird's Laugh

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Global Warming Driving Balearic Shearwaters into UK Waters

Rising sea temperatures are driving increasing numbers of Europe’s most endangered seabird into UK waters. Around ten per cent of the world population of Balearic shearwaters has visited UK inshore waters this summer and autumn, with more than 1,200 birds being recorded from just one watchpoint near Land’s End in Cornwall. read more...

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Australia: Study finds global warming affecting bird migration

Climate change may not be noticeable to all humans yet, but the behaviour of birds suggests the seasons have already changed.

A researcher at the weather bureau has found that some spring migrating birds are arriving many days earlier than they used to.

Another critically endangered species has adapted its breeding cycle in response to climate change. Read More...

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Hawk Migration and Climate Change

Scientists Look To Protect Species From Climate Change

Every autumn since 1983, an annual ritual on what birders call "Hawk Hill", in the Marin Headlands, takes place.

They point binoculars and scopes to take a census of nineteen species, roughly 40,000 birds a year.

The birds have flown this route long before the Army was here, or people.

In fact, their patterns trace back to the last ice age.

Now, as the climate changes again, Allen Fish of the Golden Gate Raptor Observatory wonders how it affects these creatures at the top of the food chain.

This year, they'll look closely at the rough legged hawk, which travels all the way from the arctic.

The numbers show that in the past twenty-five years.

The rough legged hawk has arrived five days later, which may not sound like much.

"It might be a statistical blip or a trend with serious implications because nature is interconnected.

"We're talking about is a potential to desynchronize a huge range of biological events," said Allen Fish, Golden Gate Raptor Observatory. Read More...

Tags: Birds, Climate Change, Global Warming

News Roundup

A proposed tidal power project in the UK would seriously threaten existing intertidal habitat.

Dr Mark Avery, the RSPB's conservation director, said tackling climate change is hugely important, but that it can be done "without destroying irreplaceable national treasures like the Severn estuary".

"The government should be aiming to help [and] not destroy wildlife, and that applies to proposals for green energy schemes just as much as new supermarkets or housing estates," he added. read more...

Global Warming and changing Bird Behavior

According to an article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer, several ornithological researchers suspect global warming is leading to changes in bird behavior, namely in regards to bird distribution, population and migratory patterns.

The American Bird Conservancy predicts doom for more than half of the migrating species in the Great Lakes region if warming continues at its current pace from a report issued in its publication titled "A Birdwatcher's Guide to Global Warming."

Here is just a sampling of some of the behavioral changes that are being noticed in the Midwest.......

--The Northern Mockingbird, more of a southern bird, has expanded far into the upper Midwest.
--Mississippi Kites nested in southern Ohio recently, which is the farthest north ever recorded.
--Cerulean Warbler population is down 70% over the past 25 years.
--Orioles and Black-Capped Chickadees are becoming much more common in northern areas, while diminishing on the southern end of their normal range. read more...

Birds' changing migration patterns due to global warming

For Lake Erie birders, this prediction sounds, well, a little eerie.

John Pogacnik, a naturalist with the Lake Metroparks says the kinds and numbers of birds in the area have changed dramatically over the past decade.

During the Christmas Bird Count at Kelleys Island last year, Pogacnik counted more than 100 hermit thrush where there had never been more than a handful before.

The Ohio Division of Wildlife says birds are following the bugs, which are relocating as temperatures rise. read more...

Birds' changing behavior is warning of global warming

Consider other avian changes in Ohio:

Northern mockingbirds - those rowdy mimics of the south - have expanded far into the upper Midwest and are abundant in the briars at Whiskey Island on Cleveland's lakefront.

A pair of Mississippi kites - sleek, gray raptors common in the Deep South - nested and fledged a chick this past summer on a golf course in Hocking County in southern Ohio. It marked the farthest north the kites had ever nested and the first time on record in Ohio. read more...

Australian Birdlife facing the challenge of survival

Professor Garnett in his research, the history of threatened birds in Australia and its offshore islands, listed disturbing predictions that 45 Australian bird species were threatened to some degree by increase in temperature by 2050.

The impact of climate change was now starting to show an impact on numbers, said Professor Garnett.

The fairy tern has disappeared from South Australia because of the salinity killing of the fish they feed on and the mismanagement of river flows that destroys their nests. read more...

Tags: Birds, Climate Change, Global Warming

Bird threatened by climate change

A rare game bird which recently made a comeback in Wales could be wiped out by climate change in just 20 years, according to a new report.
Black grouse numbers dropped to 131 active males in 1997, but rose to 247 by 2005.

But the species faces extinction in Wales if global warming continues at the current rate, research suggests.
Read More...

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Migratory birds and whales confused by warming

Birds, whales and other migratory creatures are suffering from global warming that puts them in the wrong place at the wrong time, a U.N. official told 166-nation climate talks on Monday. Read More...

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Birds to become latest indicators of climate change

Birds have long been used as indicators of the state of the world’s ecosystems, providing insights into habitat loss, deterioration, and pollution. Now a new project, starting this month, will add climate change to the list. Read More...

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Climate change putting bird species in danger

Connecticut is home to as many as 20 percent of the world's population of saltmarsh sharp-tailed sparrows, but climate change is endangering their way of life, according to researchers.

The birds have traditionally thrived in the privacy offered by dense saltmarsh grass, but in light of rising sea levels caused by climate change, high tide is more frequently destroying their nests and washing them out to sea, researchers and environmentalists said. Read More...

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Next American Species To Go Extinct May Be Two Hawaiian Birds, Global Warming Amplifies Threats

Evidence suggests that rising average temperatures could allow mosquitoes to survive at higher, elevations, exposing the birds to deadly diseases. Researchers for the U.S. Geological Survey conclude that even a small increase in temperatures in Hawaii's forests will eliminate much of the mosquito-free safe zone that once existed for Kauai's birds. Read More...

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Snow Goose Explosion

A large increase in the Snow Goose population in the Stillaguamish and Skagit river valleys is creating problems for farmers:

And the population could rise even more. Unusually warm temperatures in the birds' breeding habitat on Wrangel Island, in the Russian Arctic, have led to more chicks hatching and surviving.

Davison said the island's warm temperatures may be a result of global warming. If so, conditions could grow still milder and bring yet more geese.
Read More...

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Penguins join climate change investigation

Scientists are taking the unorthodox step of using king penguins to help determine the true extent of climate change.

The University of Birmingham says that mapping the behaviour of the Antarctic birds to better understand global warming is the reverse of the standard practice of measuring the effects of climate change upon fish patterns or avian migration.
Read More...

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Struggling Seabirds

West Coast seabirds are dying, apparently from a lack of food -- and some researchers think the phenomenon may be linked to global climate change.

This is the third year that scientists have found unusually large numbers of marine birds -- mainly common murres, but also rhinoceros auklets and tufted puffins -- washed up on beaches in California, Oregon and Washington. In 2005, the first year of the phenomenon, large numbers of Cassin's auklets also died. ...

Sydeman said the anomalies could be linked to global climate change.

"What's clear is that during the past decade, there's much more variability out there than there was during the preceding 40 years," he said.
Read More...

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Decline in Cuckoo Numbers and Global Warming

Instead, Glue believes that the main reason why the cuckoo is in crisis is to be found not in the UK but thousands of miles away in Africa. "We know that the cuckoo overwinters in East Africa, which is increasingly being hit by drought as a result of climate change and which is making conditions very difficult for both wildlife and people in the region," he says.
Read More...

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United Kingdom: Birds 'struggle to cope' with climate change

Birds are finding it increasingly difficult to cope with the changing British climate, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) has warned.

Milder winters and cold snaps are affecting feeding routines and altering migratory patterns.

As a result, the number of birds counted by participants in January's Big Garden Birdwatch was down, with some breeds hitting a five-year low.
Read More...

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Ducks on the Chesapeake

Batt said climate change is throwing the bird world out of whack. Like the canvasbacks, which are wintering farther north, mallards that once spent the cold months in Mississippi and Arkansas are instead spending the season in Missouri and Kansas. The blue-winged teal, which typically rides out the winter in Cuba and South America, has switched locales to Louisiana and Texas.

"Climate change is the story," Batt said. "Nobody knows how this is all going to shake out in the long run, and each species is a little different."
Read More...

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Birds Shift North

More bird species in the United States are ranging farther north and even staying there for the winter in a possible sign of adaptation to global warming, ornithologists and conservation groups say.

Some indicators come from the recent Great Backyard Bird Count, which found more swallows, orioles and other common birds in uncommon locations.

"We've got Baltimore orioles in 14 states, orchard orioles in five different reports and Scott's oriole in Pennsylvania. They shouldn't be here. They should be way south," says Paul Green of the National Audubon Society, co-sponsor of the count with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

Scientists cannot say yet whether the birds' movements are climate-related or short-term reaction to storms, hot or cold spells, disruption of habitat or food availability. However, the results of the four-day tally performed in February are "a tempting indicator of change, which may turn out to be the early stages of the effects of changing climate on bird distribution," Green says. "We won't know for certain until we have another 20 years of data."
Read More...

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Birds can be heard earlier than usual in U.K.

Tim Melling, a Royal Society for the Protection of Birds conservation officer who is based in Yorkshire, says that he heard larks singing in early February. The birds are reacting to unseasonably warm and sunny weather.

Britain is emerging from its warmest winter ever recorded. BBC weatherman Paul Hudson reported that the county's highest ever January overnight temperate, 11.5 degrees Celcius, was recorded at Leeming, a temperature more normal at that time of year for North Africa rather than North Yorkshire.
Read More...

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Birds arrive early in Australia

A CHANGE in climate could be the cause of the early arrival of orange-bellied parrots to the south-west.

Co-ordinator for the South West Orange-Bellied Parrot Working Group, Dianne Davis, said one of the rare birds was spotted with a flock of blue-winged parrots on a property at Killarney last week.
Read More...

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The Theme for International Migratory Bird Day 2007 is "Birds in a Changing Climate"

Birds have long been indicators of envionmental change, sounding the alarm about the impacts of pesticides, polluted water, and the loss of contiguous forest. While IMBD continues to promote the joy of birds, it will also tackle a challenging, yet pertinent topic in 2007 - climate change.

The reactions of birds to weather have long been noted. For hundreds of years, farmers have used the arrivals of migratory birds to make decisions about planting crops. Changes in the movements of some species is just one indicator of the warming of the Earth's atmosphere. Today, as the rate of warming increases, scientists are exploring how climate change will affect birds and how we can reduce our impact.
Go to the IMBD Site

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Birds and Climate Change in Kansas

As for the timing of the birds' migration, some suspect that changes in weather patterns could be responsible.

"We're experiencing climate change all over the world," Roth said. "Whether they call it global warming is a whole other issue, but the change in climate is being expressed in delayed migration in the autumn and earlier migration in the springtime." Read More...

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Birds arrive early in the UK

Move over cuckoos. In this era of global warming the chiffchaff has become the harbinger of spring.

The first sightings of chiffchaffs in Britain this year were reported yesterday prompting bird watchers to proclaim that spring has started.

It joined a wealth of indicators that spring has well and truly arrived, including frogspawn in northern Scotland, butterflies by the score and flowers everywhere.

This time last year the country was still in the grip of snow and Arctic winds.

Yesterday Gravesend in Kent recorded 18C (64F), the highest temperature of the year so far — whereas in 2006 it was late April before similar warmth was felt.

Read More...

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Swallows are arriving and nature's stirring but hold on

Alan Davies, site manager at the RSPB's Conwy reserve, said this spring is the most bizarre he has ever experienced.There has been spring-like activity for weeks, he said. 'This has been the earliest spring ever in the bird world; it is totally unprecedented. It is easily five or six weeks ahead - it's all gone haywire.

'A swallow was spotted in South Wales on February 18, after flying here from the Cape, South Africa. The wheatear and sand martin are already here too. They are very early - it's crazy.

'The black-backed gull that winters in Morocco arrived in huge numbers in February and reed bunting - usually here in April - were sighted on February 20.

'Lapwing are already making their nests ready for breeding. And the bird dawn chorus sounds fantastic at the moment and has already reached the peak levels you would usually expect in April.' Read More...

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Climate Change and Birds on New Hampshire Public Radio

My friend Mary is quite enthralled with cardinals. It’s not only how handsome the bright red males are or how dedicated they are to their less colorful mates, but because they are a relatively new phenomenon for her. When Mary first moved into her New Hampshire home more than 60 years ago, cardinals were rare.

But now these pretty birds are found throughout the Granite State from Brookline to Berlin. The reason has been attributed to the increase in bird-feeders but can also be linked to our increasingly milder winters. read more...

Tags: Birds, Climate Change, Global Warming

Global warming threatens Scottish puffin paradise

One of Britain's largest puffin colonies is being wiped out by an invasive plant that is thriving in warmer temperatures brought about by climate change.

In just seven years a colony of 29,000 breeding pairs of puffins on the island of Craigleith, just a mile from the coast of North Berwick, has been reduced to fewer than 3,000. They have been driven to the edge of extinction by a dusky-pink, 8ft flowering plant called tree mallow. Introduced by 18th-century lighthouse keepers and sheep farmers on nearby Bass Rock the woolly-leafed plant is renowned for its medicinal properties and was used as natural bandage. read more...

Tags: Birds, Climate Change, Global Warming

Is this bird a product of global warming?

A WILDLIFE sanctuary has rescued a two-week-old blackbird, the first time
such a young bird has been found at this time of year.The fledgling was
discovered in a garden in South London and brought to the Willow Wildlife
Sanctuary in Chislehurst by a concerned bird lover.Eddie Williams, who runs the
rescue service said: "This has got to be a first, and it must be because of the
mild weather. It takes 13 days for these birds to incubate, and then another 13
to 14 days to fly after the egg has hatched."The egg must have been laid around
January 20 at the latest, as the bird is still a few days away from growing the
full tail it needs to fly.Mr Williams will keep the bird for up to two weeks to
ensure it is fit and healthy when it is released.

Tags: Birds, Climate Change, Global Warming

UNEP/CMS Report: Migratory Species and Climate Change

Around a fifth of the bird species listed under the Convention could be affected by rising sea levels, erosion and greater wave action linked with climate change. read more

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Upsurge in British Vulture Sightings

The increase in sightings could be the result of climate change encouraging the griffin vulture, a smaller variety which survives in Europe, to come to Britain. read more

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