Each map is a visual guide to where a particular bird species may find the climate conditions it needs to survive in the future. We call this the bird’s “climatic range.”
The colors indicate the season in which the bird may find suitable conditions— blue for winter, yellow for summer (breeding), and green for where they overlap (indicating their presence year-round).
The darker the shaded area, the more likely it is the bird species will find suitable climate conditions to survive there.
The outline of the approximate current range for each season remains fixed in each frame, allowing you to compare how the range will expand, contract, or shift in the future.
The first frame of the animation shows where the bird can find a suitable climate today (based on data from 2000). The next three frames predict where this bird’s suitable climate may shift in the future—one frame each for 2020, 2050, and 2080.
You can play or pause the animation with the orange button in the lower left, or select an individual frame to study by clicking on its year.
Hardy and adaptable, the Greater Yellowlegs has been showing up on recent years’ Christmas Bird Counts with increasing frequency, especially well inland in the southern U.S.—a trend that may accelerate in the decades ahead. Audubon’s climate model forecasts areas with suitable climate to more than double in extent in winter, with the species wintering north well into the Midwest and Great Lakes region. However in the summer season, trouble appears ahead, as only 19% of the current range is predicted to be climate stable. As will affect other boreal breeders, a key consideration for the future will be forest health—a matter of considerable concern.
Explore more birds threatened by climate change around the country.
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