Birds and Climate Change: Impacts and Conservation Responses

From the red grouse to the Ethiopian bush-crow, bird populations around the world can provide us with vital insights into the effects of climate change on species and ecosystems. They are among the best studied and monitored of organisms, yet many are already under threat of extinction as a result of habitat loss, overexploitation and pollution. Providing a single source of information for students, scientists, practitioners and policy-makers, this book begins with a critical review of the existing impacts of climate change on birds, including changes in the timing of migration and breeding and effects on bird populations around the world. The second part considers how conservationists can assess potential future impacts, quantifying how extinction risk is linked to the magnitude of global change and synthesising the evidence in support of likely conservation responses. The final chapters assess the threats posed by efforts to reduce the magnitude of climate change.

James Pearce-Higgins is a Principal Ecologist at the British Trust for Ornithology, where he leads on climate change research across the organisation and manages the Population Ecology and Modelling team. He is responsible for a range of research projects to examine the evidence for climate change impacts on biodiversity, undertaking projections of future responses and conducting research to inform how conservation should adapt to climate change.

Rhys E. Green is Principal Research Biologist at The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and Honorary Professor of Conservation Science at the University of Cambridge. His research focuses on measuring the effects of human land use, disturbance, illegal killing, climatic change and conservation management on the demography of bird populations, using the insights this provides to devise conservation programmes.