Rising air temperatures mean shorter winters and earlier springs.
Native wildflowers, such as these Dutchman’s breeches (Dicentra cucullaria) that bloom early in spring are losing access to sunlight as trees leaf out earlier.
Katja Schulz/Flickr
Many beloved wildflowers bloom in early spring, while trees are still bare and the flowers have access to sunlight. Climate change is throwing trees and wildflowers out of sync.
Brown-veined white butterflies migrate annually from the Kalahari region to Mozambique.
Instinctively RDH/Shutterstock
Journals, museum collections and other historical sources can provide valuable data for modern ecological studies. But just because a source is old doesn’t make it useful.
Bees look for water on an outdoor tap in Berlin, Germany during a hot spell, June 19, 2022.
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Honey bees, wild and native bees face threats from parasites, pesticides and habitat loss. Shorter winters, more extreme weather and more habitat destruction won’t help.
Migrating waterbirds over South Dakota’s Huron Wetland Management District on North America’s Central Flyway.
Sandra Uecker, USFWS/Flickr
Satellite telemetry, tiny geolocation tags and passive acoustic recording are providing new insights into bird migration and vital data for conservation.
Some cities never sleep.
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Artificial light is upending trees’ ability to use the natural day-night cycle as a signal of seasonal change.
Changes in climate affect the timings of various points in the life cycle of plants, including when flowers bloom in spring and when leaves wither in autumn.
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Climatologists study data over a long time to understand weather patterns and what causes them. Biometeorologists explore the impact that the weather and climate have on people, plants and animals.
Floodwaters in the town of Bushmans River in the Eastern Cape of South Africa.
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The picture seems hopeless, but with mitigation and adaptation strategies and policies driven through COP26, southern Africa can reduce the impacts of climate change on local livelihoods.
A late snowfall could set back the growth of this budding lilac.
oddharmonic/Flickr
Trees and shrubs in cold-weather climates rely on certain signals, such as temperature and light, to know when to leaf out and bloom. Climate change is scrambling those signals.
A volunteer looks for waterbirds at Point Reyes National Seashore in California during the National Audubon Society’s annual Christmas Bird Count.
Kerry W/Flickr
COVID-19 kept many scientists from doing field research in 2020, which means that important records will have data gaps. But volunteers are helping to plug some of those holes.
Biometeorology is the study of the role of climate on plants, animals and humans.
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The COVID-19 pandemic is interrupting scientific field work across North America, leaving blank spots in important data sets and making it harder to track ecological change.
Yellow trout lily flowers nearly a week earlier now than in previous decades in the Appalachian Mountains.
Katja Schulz/Wikipedia
Climate change has advanced the arrival of spring by as much as several weeks in some parts of the US. This can mean major crop losses and disconnects between species that need each other to thrive.
A mast year can be a squirrel’s dream come true.
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Masting is what biologists call the pattern of trees for miles around synchronizing to all produce lots of seeds − or very few. Why and how do they get on schedule?