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 is particularly well named: it nests only in pine woodlands of the East. Audubon's climate model projects a significant (72 percent) shift in summer range and a small (22 percent) decrease in ideal summer climate space. Unlike most warblers, this species’ winter range is currently almost entirely within the U.S. The model predicts that to remain true, but that the range may shift northward. While climatically suitable area is projected to become available along the Pacific Coast and in Alaska, this eastern short-distance migrant is probably not well suited to take advantage of them.
Explore more birds threatened by climate change around the country.
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