ENWC201 Chapter Notes - Chapter 17: Sea Level Rise, Phenotypic Plasticity, Mercury Poisoning
18 May 2018
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Chapter 17 – Climate Change and Wildlife
Introduction
● IPCC is the intergovernmental panel on Climate change
Changes in Climate
● Temperature
○ Northern hemisphere is warming faster than southern hemisphere ebase it has
more land area, land warms faster than ocean
● Sea level
○ Annual rate of 1.8mm until 2003 risen to 3.1mm
○ Will cause inundation of coastal area, flooding, erosion, saltwater intrusion, rising
water tables, and impede drainage and habitat loss
○ Thermal expansion is the physical increase in volume of water as it warms and is
the primary cause of sea level rise
■ Melting of glaciers and ice caps are second
● Loss of ice
○ Decrease In glaciers and ice caps contributes 28% of sea level rise
○ Melting of polar ice sheets are 15%
○ Glaciers in tropics and midlatitudes ar retreating and their small size makes them
more vulnerable to CC
Effects of CC on wildlife populations
● Evolutionary consequences
○ Phenotypic plasticity is the ability of individuals to modify their behavior,
morphology, or physiology to altered environmental conditions
○ Shifts in migration and ranges are often attributed to Phenotypic plasticity
○ Questions to if Phenotypic plasticity changes have genetic component leading to
evolutionary consequences
● Migration
○ Birds might advance their arrival date for breeding sites
■ Either by leaving earlier or shortening their migratory distance
● Distributional responses
○ Likely to respond by changing their range in direction of climatic niches
○ Shifts in vegetation communities
○ Range boundaries
Tools for studying wildlife responses to CC
● Bioclimatic envelope modeling
○ Also known as ecological niche models, habitat suitability models, or species
distribution models
○ Attempt to define climatic conditions that best describe species range limits by
correlating the current species distribution with selected climate variables
○ Projects these current relationships to future CC scenarios then can help forecast
future species ranges
Document Summary
Ipcc is the intergovernmental panel on climate change. Northern hemisphere is warming faster than southern hemisphere ebase it has more land area, land warms faster than ocean. Annual rate of 1. 8mm until 2003 risen to 3. 1mm. Will cause inundation of coastal area, flooding, erosion, saltwater intrusion, rising water tables, and impede drainage and habitat loss. Thermal expansion is the physical increase in volume of water as it warms and is the primary cause of sea level rise. Melting of glaciers and ice caps are second. Decrease in glaciers and ice caps contributes 28% of sea level rise. Melting of polar ice sheets are 15% Glaciers in tropics and midlatitudes ar retreating and their small size makes them more vulnerable to cc. Phenotypic plasticity is the ability of individuals to modify their behavior, morphology, or physiology to altered environmental conditions. Shifts in migration and ranges are often attributed to phenotypic plasticity.
