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.
During the winter season, this portly sandpiper is at home amid the spray of ocean waves on beach rocks up and down the length of the Pacific Ocean. Occurrences of wintering Surfbirds anywhere else are notable. Audubon's climate model forecasts a 75 percent loss of current winter range by 2080, with a substantial transfer of suitable wintering range from the immediate Pacific Coast. Given the Surfbird’s tight link with rocky seashores along the Pacific Coast, there is reason to question whether the species will be able to make the ecological leap.
Explore more birds threatened by climate change around the country.
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