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https://theconversation.com/the-chickadee-in-the-snowbank-a-canary-in-the-coal-mine-for-climate-change-in-the-sierra-nevada-mountains-217255>
"Wet snow pelts my face and pulls against my skis as I climb above 8,000 feet
in the Sierra Nevada of eastern California, tugging a sled loaded with
batteries, bolts, wire and 40 pounds of sunflower seeds critical to our
mountain chickadee research.
As we reach the remote research site, I duck under a tarp and open a laptop. A
chorus of identification numbers are shouted back and forth as fellow
behavioral ecologist Vladimir Pravosudov and I program “smart” bird feeders for
an upcoming experiment.
I have spent the past six years monitoring a population of mountain chickadees
here, tracking their life cycles and, importantly, their memory, working in a
system Pravosudov established in 2013. The long, consistent record from this
research site has allowed us to observe how chickadees survive in extreme
winter snowfall and to identify ecological patterns and changes.
In recent history, intense winters are often followed by drought years here in
the Sierra Nevada and in much of the U.S. West. This teeter-totter pattern has
been identified as one of the unexpected symptoms of climate change, and its
impact on the chickadees is providing an early warning of the disruptions ahead
for the dynamics within these coniferous forest ecosystems.
Our research shows that a mountain chickadee facing deep snow is, to borrow a
cliche, like a canary in a coal mine – its survivability tells us about the
challenges ahead."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
