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.
From May to August each year, this is one of the most characteristic birds of western forests—from near tree line down into broadleaf groves in the lowlands. The only requirements for nesting Western Wood-Pewees seem to be trees and aerial insects. Audubon's climate model forecasts a 74 percent loss of current summer range by 2090, mostly showing contraction, but offering some potential expansion to the north. As climate change disrupts forest health in the wood-pewee’s current range, movement to new areas to the north and east seems possible. There will have to be trees, however, and a robust aerial insect prey base—two uncertainties in the face of a changing climate.
Explore more birds threatened by climate change around the country.
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