Audubon’s Bird-brained Conclusion: More Global Warming Misdirection
By Chip Knappenberger -- February 11, 2009On Tuesday, the National Audubon Society released a report “Birds and Climate Change,” which interpreted an average northern shift of the over-wintering range of a large collection of North American bird species over the course of the past 40 years or so. Audubon decided that this range shift was due, in part, to “global warming.” Therefore, it was bad and action must be taken to avert it:
It is the complete picture of widespread movement and the failure of some species to move at all that illustrate the impacts of climate change on birds. They are sending us a powerful signal that we need to 1) take policy action to curb climate change and its impacts, and 2) help wildlife and ecosystems adapt to unavoidable habitat changes, even as we work to curb climate change itself.
What the Audubon Society failed to mention was that contained within the data from its own report was that the numbers of bird species with increasing populations topped those with population declines by a margin of more than 2-to-1. In other words, “global warming” has been a net benefit for the Audubon’s collection of North American bird species. Which leaves you wondering, why would we want to take action that could result in a countering of that trend?
The Audubon Society’s report describes the analysis of 40 years’ worth of data-collecting under their Christmas Bird Count (CBC) program. For three weeks of each year around Christmas time, volunteers from around the country conduct bird counts within their designated observing area. The methodology of the CBC program is designed so that the data collected can be used in subsequent historical analyses aimed at tracking the patterns of bird species (and their numbers) both spatially and temporally.
The latest analysis of this CBC dataset was geared towards assessing the patterns of the winter range of 305 North American bird species and whether or not they were related to temperature conditions. It turns out that over the past 40 years (from the early 1960s to the early 2000s) the average winter range of the collection of bird species has moved northward by about 40 miles. Since the early 1960s were a cool period and the early 2000s were warm one, the temperature rise during this period seems a likely culprit. Audubon highlighted the 20 fastest moving species as well as the trace of January average temperature across the United States in the figure copied below.
Figure 1. The movement of the centroid of the winter range of the 20 North American bird species with the greatest range shift, along with the history of the U.S. average January temperature, 1966-2005 (inset) (figure source, http://www.audubon.org/bird/bacc/index.html)
Which is all well and good—North America’s bird species are adapting their behavior to a changing climate. So what’s the problem?
Actually, Audubon was largely at a loss to find one, instead trying to convince us that evidence of climate change is reason enough to try to stop it—apparently Audubon knows what the “best” climate is for birds.
Well, perhaps they don’t.
Hidden in the recesses of their “Birds and Climate Change” report (their Appendix 1) is a table of various statistics that were calculated for each of the 305 bird species analyzed. Included in the large table among the statistics for things such as how far each species has moved northward and how far it has moved inland, was the value (and statistical significance) of the overall population trend for each species. Funny that, in a report describing how “global warming” is impacting bird species, Audubon didn’t highlight the ultimate test of bird species’ health—the overall population trends.
They reason becomes clear when you start looking over the numbers.
Of the 20 species highlighted in their figure (Figure 1 above), 9 of them showed statistically significant population increases, 9 of them had no statistically significant change in population, and only 2 of the species showed population declines.
Of the overall 305 species analyzed, 120 (39%) showed statistically significant population increases, 128 (42%) showed no change, and 57 (19%) showed statistically significant declines.
This is strong indication that, in net, North American bird species have seemed to improve their overall condition during the past 40 years—a time of winter warming.
One potential reason is that most of these bird species tend to spend their summers further north than they do their winters—migrating between their preferred winter and summer ranges in the spring and fall. Birds don’t migrate for the fun of it, but to find the resources to meet their needs—food, nesting grounds, competition avoidance, etc. As migration is a particularly taxing time on the birds, the less distance they have to migrate the better. That they don’t have to travel as far south in the winter is a good thing. And since, over the past 40 years, summer temperatures across North America have warmed much less than winter temperatures, it is quite likely that the total average distance that North America’s bird species have to migrate each year has declined (and the populations have grown).
Audubon wants you to sign their petition pushing for action on climate change based upon the findings of their bird report—not because of findings of harm, but simply of effect:
Our recently-released Birds and Climate report clearly shows that climate change is affecting birds – and our world – now. For the past 40 years, as our climate has warmed, birds have shifted their winter ranges further and further north. This ecological disruption is yet another wake up call that we must act quickly to solve the climate crisis. The birds’ northward movement is another signal that climate change is here and action is needed now.
We need global warming legislation that will help birds and wildlife survive what is coming by protecting their habitats and will reduce global warming pollution 80 percent by 2050 to avoid the worst impacts of a rapidly changing climate. Tell your lawmakers where you stand on global warming by signing our petition.
Don’t you think it would be decent of the National Audubon Society to highlight to their potential petition signers that they would be lending their support for legislation which is aimed to combat an effect that is leading to an overall improvement in the general health of North America’s bird species?
[Update: Audubon has now included a FAQ about their analysis on their website which includes a discussion of the population increases–predictably, they find no good news in those numbers!]
Q: Didn’t some species fare really well over the past 40 years (even showing population increases)?
A-Yes, many of the species that moved north and inland increased in population at the same time. But it would be short-sighted to focus on what may appear to be short-term gains. Where food or habitat is available, species may do well in the short term, but ultimately the need to adjust to changing climate conditions can put species in peril in a variety of ways. Some will move into areas where an unusually harsh winter will still bring conditions they cannot survive. Others may be unable to find food or suitable habitat (especially if the healthy habitats they need, like grasslands) are already being decimated by overuse, pollution, and other threats. Even species that fare well amid the changes are likely to force out other, less adaptable birds, taking a long-term toll on ecological health and all it supports.
Why didn’t the Bird-Brains include data for 2006, 2007, and 2008? I’ll bet I can guess…
The thrust of the study is that several bird species have expanded the range to the north. What is not indicated is that the remain in their original territory as well.
I know a great deal about one of the studied species, the marbled murrelet, a seabird whose range extends from northern California to Alaska. It has been listed as threatened per the Endangered Species Act in the Pacific Northwest. This bird is not in jeopardy anywhere within its range.
The murrelet may be expanding its range to the north, but it has not evacuated from any part of its normal range while doing so.
This kind of study is no more legitimate than push polling that is designed to support a predetermined conclusion.
One bird not doing too well despite huge acreages being set aside forever as a habitat particularly meant for its survival, is the “Northern” Spotted Owl, which is an official government-created sub-species of the common Spotted Owl. Our children are taught that Northern and Mexican Spotted Owls are very unique and irreplaceable species, the Northern variety being slightly smaller in size than other Spotted Owls. But Northern Spotted Owls are disappearing, still obstinately going extinct, apparently because Horned Owls did not read the EPA’s official management plan and are busy “horning in” on the protected habitat created at the cost of 50,000 good middle-class jobs which once existed built on what was once considered a renewable resource.
Mike: as I understand the problem, the spotted owls are being displaced by the more aggressive barred owls.
The appendix appears to have been changed; at least the one I downloaded no longer had the population data.
Whoops, I knew it was barred owls and misremembered while I typed. But this being Darwin’s birthday and all I was reading that “survival of the fittest” was not actually a concept from Darwin himself and it certainly isn’t popular among today’s evolutionists. So, if barred owls are aggressively shouldering aside “Northern” Spotted Owls it just must be some type of freak nature thing, because according to Spotted Owl theory a larger owl should not be able to make a living in the Old Growth forests, for the reason that Old Growth forest floors really do not support as many small mammals as younger forests.
Which leads me to the supposition that maybe the barred owls are making their living in the austere Old Growth environment by eating small song birds and other exotic fowl being forced northward by CLIMATE CHANGE.
As I type this part the temp outside here near Seattle is five degrees colder than normal, which is pretty much the way it has been all winter. Our local daily newspaper the Seattle Post Intelligencer ignored the reality outside its doors to run the big Audubon story on how the warming of the Pacific NW seems to be causing all this feathered population shift. The temp numbers they were using were just for the month of January every year and they are claiming that it is the “extremes” of temperature range that determine what a species likes, not the average temperature.
I’ve linked to your post from Discerning Science – Global Warming – Debate
Mike: ” Our local daily newspaper the Seattle Post Intelligencer ignored the reality ”
Didn’t I just read that that paper is almost bankrupt? If so, I wonder why?
I can tell you as birds winter further north the southern populations do decline. We used to have 35,000 Canada Geese wintering in north Alabama, now those birds spend the winter further north and we have less than a thousand migratory Canada Geese. The Audubon Society should have better emphasized the big question which is how long will it be before species that need tundra and boreal forests to nest will lose their breeding habitats as those habitats disappear? We had better all hope as climate changes we do not lose rainfall over currently moist areas or currently semi-dry areas such as the bread basket of the Great Plains. While you folks seem to want to debate the effects of global warming, why take a chance. Buy some compact florecent bulbs and take other measures to conserve energy.
Ken,what about cycles?
What happened during the MWP and the LIA climatic periods.Did they migrate north or south during those times?
Changing light bulbs typesare a nonsense idea to conserve energy.They are very minor player in energy consumption.
How about improved home and office building designs or build Nuclear plants instead?
WE can greatly improve what we have as long as it makes economical sense.
Ken wrote on 02.14.09 at 10:01 pm “I can tell you as birds winter further north the southern populations do decline. We used to have 35,000 Canada Geese wintering in north Alabama, now those birds spend the winter further north and we have less than a thousand migratory Canada Geese. The Audubon Society should have better emphasized the big question which is how long will it be before species that need tundra and boreal forests to nest will lose their breeding habitats as those habitats disappear? We had better all hope as climate changes we do not lose rainfall over currently moist areas or currently semi-dry areas such as the bread basket of the Great Plains. While you folks seem to want to debate the effects of global warming, why take a chance. Buy some compact florecent bulbs and take other measures to conserve energy.”
HORSE HOCKY! News flash for you Ken- I grew up skiing and fishing on the Alabama river in south central Alabama a couple of hundred miles south of Huntsville or Florence or wherever you live in North Alabama- prior to about 10 years ago guess what species we NEVER saw down here? GEESE! Guess what has happened in the last 10 years- I have personally observed 100’s of geese over wintering here, there are even dozens of nesting pairs that stay well into the spring and raise young. How are you going to spin what I have seen with my own eyeballs? Suggest that the rising temps caused me to hallucinate?
Accept reality- you environmental extremists have lost the debate- focusing your energies and OUR money on real environmental issues is the only sane course of action.
Not only did Audubon deceive us with the bird data, they deceived us in regards to the temperature data/trends that they used.
http://www.nofreewind.com/2009/07/how-national-audubon-society-deceives.html
my analysis the bird population trends.
http://www.nofreewind.com/2009/07/how-national-audubon-society-deceives_14.html
Summary of their deception
Summary of their deception
http://www.nofreewind.com/2009/07/how-national-audubon-society-deceives_13.html
The URL of the Appendix (pdf) is:
http://www.audubon.org/news/pressroom/bacc/pdfs/Appendix.pdf
The overall population trend for each species is the 5th to last column of the large table (whose width spans several pages).
-Chip