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.
This species replaces the closely related Purple Finch in coniferous forests of the mountains of the interior west. It has a slightly crested look to the head and more delicate patterning overall. Since it is a bird of higher elevations, climate change is due to have a profoundly negative impact on it. Audubon's climate model projects that only 23 percent of the current summer range is stable, and the total amount of suitable climate space is anticipated to contract by 70 percent. It’s a similar situation in winter, with a 61-percent decrease in total available climate space and 67 percent of the current range becoming unsuitable. If the model’s projections hold true, Cassin’s Finch will become a scarce and local bird by 2080.
Explore more birds threatened by climate change around the country.
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