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The Heat Is On: Climate Change Causes Birds To Hatch Early (australiangeographic.com.au)

Posted by yaelk on from the which-came-first-the-chicken-or-the-egg dept.

grrlscientist writes: A recently published study reveals that climate change can cause birds' eggs to hatch early. In addition to creating warmer temperatures that trigger early embryonic development in birds, climate change also increases the frequency and duration of heat waves. Thus, warming temperatures are leading to asynchronous hatching of individual eggs within a clutch and increased chick mortality, particularly for birds breeding in the tropics and semi-tropics, and in tropical deserts.

5 of 123 comments (clear)

  1. Interesting findings; and related... by skelly33 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I read another study about a year ago (the link for which I can't find, so I profusely apologize in advance for the lack of citation), which also found that warmer temperatures were causing eggs to hatch sooner... but that the new birdlings were starving to death for a different reason: the timing of their hatching no longer aligns with the bloom of insects which are required for their sustenance. Apparently the insects did not get the memo that the warmer temperatures should also make them spring forth earlier in the season. So they are still business as usual after the young birds are already dying out, but as far as the birds are concerned, the bugs are late to the party... now I wonder if an additional side effect is an atypically larger insect population due to the comparative lack of predators.

    1. Re:Interesting findings; and related... by riverat1 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      And having looked at the dataset, I can conclude that it is incomplete (as shown) because there is no date ranges for each of the data points in the spread graph (fig 1). All it shows is that the heat band (grey box) is the danger zone. They haven't shown increasing temperatures as the cause for the datapoints in that range.

      With an analysis of the graph like that I can see why I always think you don't have a clue what you're talking about. The x-axis of the graph is clearly labeled July through June (the equivalent seasonally of January through December in the Northern Hemisphere) and the caption to the graph says the points of the graph represent the daily maximum temperature from 2005 to 2013. On top of that the caption says the grey band is the ideal range for avian embryo development.

      The paper wasn't trying to say anything about anthropogenic global warming, it was just looking at the effect of temperature on the nesting success of zebra finches.

  2. Caribou as well. by darkonc · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Native communities in Northern Saskatchewan are dealing with the problem of caribou herds moving north. Their ranges are no longer within range of hunters from the communities. I theory, the climate change would have probably cause buffalo to move north to replace them, but the buffalo are mostly extinct, now.

    --
    Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
  3. We're all gonna die!!!!!! by NotDrWho · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The end is nigh!!!!!!

    --
    SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
  4. Re:Confirmation Bias by riverat1 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Or you could go actually read the original paper to see if you could detect any confirmation bias. I did and it's not that hard to read if you have a little biology literacy.