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.
Birders often remark that the West Coast gets all the “good” alcids. That’s mainly true, but the Razorbill is a notable exception to the rule. This classy seabird’s North American range is limited strictly to the sea cliffs and open ocean off the East Coast. Audubon’s climate model, however, suggests that may change, as climatically suitable regions may soon become available on the West Coast, though at the cost of over half of the current climate space on the East Coast. A huge challenge at the current time is dispersal; but with sea ice in the Arctic Ocean widely expected to continue melting, Razorbills may now be able to make the biogeographic leap from East to West.
Explore more birds threatened by climate change around the country.
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