Helping Birds Weather Climate Change
Climate change menaces birds in many ways, but conservationists are already hard at work tackling some of the most significant threats. Below are some strategies for adaptation and mitigation being used by American Bird Conservancy (ABC), our partners, and other conservationists — each for a different threat posed by climate change.
Fire Prevention and Control
Although fire is a key naturally occurring component of fire-adapted ecosystems, including many grasslands and some kinds of woodlands, climate-change-driven wildfire is an increasing threat to areas protected for the conservation of birds. This is especially true for habitat types that are not fire-adapted, like many humid forests and cloud forests, where no fire may have occurred for centuries. As climate change raises temperatures, drying vegetation and drought can become more common, increasing the risk posed by wildfire.
For example, in central Brazil's cerrado habitat, fires driven by climate change have threatened protected areas. With ABC support, local partner organization Instituto Araguaia developed a fire control program to extinguish blazes before they destroy protected habitat. The Kaempfer's Woodpecker and Bare-faced Curassow, both listed as Vulnerable to extinction by the IUCN, still have a place to live and thrive, but the threat of devastating fire is an eye-opener, not only in this region but throughout Latin America and in North America as well. There, wildfires could possibly threaten habitat for species such as the Gunnison Sage-Grouse, as well as areas of the Arctic protected for nesting waterfowl and shorebirds.
Planting Trees for Birds and Carbon Storage
Reforestation is a key action, providing habitat and protecting watersheds. ABC has supported the planting of 7.4 million trees and shrubs in reserves and buffer areas, including high in the Peruvian Andes, where ABC's partner Asociación Ecosistemas Andinos (ECOAN) has mobilized local communities to plant over 1.6 million trees, restoring queuña woodlands (composed mainly of trees in the genus Polylepis) that not only help protect watersheds and capture water, but also provide key habitat for the Royal Cinclodes, White-browed Tit-Spinetail, and other birds found al-most nowhere else. Of course, reforestation itself can help sequester carbon, and even without regard to improving bird habitat, tree-planting helps reduce greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Countering Sea Level Rise's Coastal Impacts
Sea level rise is crowding out coastal marsh birds like the Saltmarsh Sparrow and Black Rail. Human structures, like causeways, seawalls, and dikes, are more and more preventing the tidal flooding of marshes and narrowing the space where marshes can form. As part of the Atlantic Coast Joint Venture, ABC works with partners like the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, South Carolina Department of Natural Resources, U.S. Forest Service, and Ducks Unlimited to support efforts to keep marshes as marshes, and restore or even build new marshes as sea level rises, especially along the coasts of North and South Carolina. Among many other benefits, these wetlands could potentially provide federally Threatened Eastern Black Rails with sufficient habitat to maintain East Coast populations.
On Islands, Seeking Higher Ground
Low-lying atolls in the Hawaiian chain and elsewhere that host large seabird colonies are already being inundated by storm surges, destroying nests or young. Scientists predict this will continue to get worse. One way to mitigate this danger: encourage colonial seabirds to nest on islands with higher ground, above the level of the surge. ABC is working with partner Molokai Land Trust to protect former seabird habitat from invasive predators, and then to attract seabirds there, such as the Laysan Albatross. One way to draw in these birds and habituate them to a site is by playing recordings of the seabirds' calls, and placing out model birds (decoys), making the place seem already occupied to birds passing by.
Expanding Conservation Upward and Poleward
Another clearly important goal is to protect habitat at higher elevations or further to the north of places where bird species now occur. That way, the birds will have protected areas when their habitat shifts. In coming decades, birds including Ecuador's Endangered El Oro Parakeet will likely benefit from such efforts: Fundación Jocotoco and ABC recently worked together to expand habitat protection to higher elevations to benefit this and other species at the Buenaventura Reserve.
This story was originally published in Bird Conservation (Spring 2023), American Bird Conservancy's member magazine. If you would like to receive the print version of our magazine, follow this link to become a member and enjoy this benefit.
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