Tropical species also threatened by climate change

NF Reporter · 10-09-2008, 09:36 PM

AP - If you can't stand global warming, get out of the tropics. While the most significant harm from climate change so far has been in the polar regions, tropical plants and animals may face an even greater threat, say scientists who studied conditions in Costa Rica.

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waltky · 10-21-2008, 02:34 AM

Tropical tigers on a tirade...

Global warming leads India tigers to village attacks
Mon Oct 20, 2008 - The number of tiger attacks on people is growing in India's Sundarban islands as habitat loss and dwindling prey caused by climate change drives them to prowl into villages for food, experts said on Monday.

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Wildlife experts say endangered tigers in the world's largest reserve are turning on humans because rising sea levels and coastal erosion are steadily shrinking the tigers' natural habitat. The Sundarbans, a 26,000 sq km (10,000 sq mile) area of low-lying swamps on India's border with Bangladesh, is dotted with hundreds of small islands criss-crossed by water channels. "In the past six months, seven fishermen were killed in an area called Netidhopani," Pranabes Sanyal of the World Conservation Union said.

"Owing to global warming, the fragile Sundarbans lost 28 percent of its habitat in the last 40 years. A part of it is the core tiger reserve area from where their prey migrated." But as sea levels rise, two islands have already disappeared and others are vulnerable. Wildlife experts say the destruction of the mangroves means the tigers' most common prey, such as crocodiles, fish and big crabs, is dwindling. Sundarban villagers pass through tiger territory on boats to fish in the sea, or to collect honey in forest areas.

"Villagers are not supposed to enter a number of islands earmarked as tiger territories, but they seldom follow the rules, get attacked and claim compensation," Pradip Shukla, a senior forest department official, told Reuters. Villager Ashutosh Dhali became a local celebrity after television cameras captured him being attacked in February. "We were trying to catch the tiger perched on a tree of our village with tranquiliser shots," said the 47-year-old villager.

More Global warming leads India tigers to village attacks | International | Reuters

waltky · 10-28-2008, 12:05 AM

Global warming linked to fewer amphibians...

Climate link to amphibian decline
Monday, 27 October 2008 - Amphibian populations at Yellowstone - the world's oldest national park - are in steep decline, a major study shows.

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The authors link this to the drying out of wetlands where the animals live and breed, which is in turn being driven by long-term climate change. The results, reported in the journal PNAS, suggest that climate warming has already disrupted one of the best-protected ecosystems on Earth. The park covers some 9,000 sq km (3,500 sq miles) in the western United States. It lies mostly within the state of Wyoming, but spills over into Montana and Idaho. The area has been protected for more than a century; US congress granted Yellowstone national park status on 1 March 1872. "There is a pretty substantial signal of climate change in this region" - Sarah McMenamin, Stanford University

Visitors flock there to see its geysers, hot springs and bubbling mud pots, fuelled by ongoing volcanism. The park's vast forests and grasslands are also home to grizzly bears, wolves and bison. But it is to much less conspicuous inhabitants - frogs, toads and salamanders - that scientists look for early indications of environment degradation. Four amphibian species are native to the park: the blotched tiger salamander (Ambystoma tigrinum melanostictum), the boreal chorus frog (Pseudacris triseriata maculata), the Columbia spotted frog (Rana luteiventris) and the boreal toad (Bufo boreas boreas). The lower Lamar Valley in northern Yellowstone harbours countless small, fishless ponds - ideal for amphibian breeding and larval development.

Downward trend

Between 1992 and 1993, researchers surveyed 46 of these "kettle" ponds, which are re-filled in spring by groundwater and snow melt running down from the hills. When a team from Stanford University in California repeated this survey between 2006 and 2008, the number of permanently dry ponds had increased four-fold. Of the ponds that remained, the proportion supporting amphibians had declined significantly.

More BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Climate link to amphibian decline