LTREB: Temporal and Spatial Variation in the Abundance and Demography of Forest Birds --Effects of Climate and Biotic Factors

Dartmouth College, Hanover NH

Investigators

Abstract

Climate patterns are changing rapidly as evidenced by increases in temperature associated with global warming and in annual variability in weather conditions. The impacts of such changes on animal populations are not well understood, but can be assessed with long-term demographic studies that take advantage of temporal and spatial variation in weather across environmental gradients. This proposal intensively examines the demographic responses of the Black-throated Blue Warbler, as well as other bird species at larger geographic scales, and quantifies annual shifts in spatial distribution and abundance. The 800 m elevational gradient at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest in the White Mountains provides a breadth of environmental conditions needed to compare the effects of intra- and inter-annual differences in local weather conditions and biotic factors (e.g., food abundance and predator density) on bird population dynamics and reproductive performance. Such information is key to assessing the potential local effects of climate change on bird populations, and ultimately to predicting how these populations and communities will respond in the future to climate-induced environmental change associated with human activities.