Canaries

Don't know if you've seen it yet, but our June issue contains a powerful feature on climate change and birds.

We'd barely had time to crack open our own copies when we received breaking news of the first global projection of how climate change and habitat destruction may combine to affect vertebrate distribution over the next century. The study's results are unsettling: hundreds of bird species may lose out due to reductions in their geographic ranges.

"We found in our study that under certain assumptions by the year 2100, 950-1,800 bird species may be imperiled or even driven to extinction by climate change and habitat destruction," says Walter Jetz, an assistant professor of biological sciences at the University of California at San Diego and the study's lead author. "Most of these species are currently not recognized as imperiled."

Echoing the first line of our June feature (and the sobering words with which Chuck concluded his editorial in the issue), Princeton University ecologist Andrew Dobson said: "These hundreds of bird species headed toward extinction are like thousands of dying canaries in coal mines. It's time we paid attention to them."

High time, indeed. — M.M.