This report on Truthdig discusses the decline in seabird populations over the past 6 decades:
Seabird populations around the world have declined greatly over recent decades, according to new research.
Image credit: Witthaya Phonsawat on freedigitalphotos.net
“A grim decline of seabird populations, native trout being driven out because of the warming of Canadian lakes, and the destruction of an entire ecosystem in the US are all highlighted in new research.
The combined evidence shows that climate change offers a part-explanation for all three observations—but human pressure and human destruction of habitat are mostly to blame.
The world’s seabirds—such as terns, albatrosses, cormorants, gulls and petrels—are quietly flying away to nowhere.
In the lakes of Ontario, the warm water-loving bass is beginning to drive out the native trout.
And in the Great Basin of the United States, a whole ecosystem has become impoverished as the flow of energy through the vegetation and its animal populations has dwindled.
(Break)
This monitored population added up to about 19% of the global count of seabirds and showed a grim decline. Overall, seabird counts had fallen by more than 69%—which adds up to 230 million birds—in the past six decades, and those seabirds that ranged the widest seemed to fare the worst.”
To read more on the changing world and what you can do to prepare, visit: www.greatwavesofchange.org
