Global Warming and Wild Life
Camille Parmesan
Integrative Biology, University of Texas at Austin
,* Global Temperatures are Rising
* Plants and Animals are Changing WHERE
they live and WHEN they live
Global
Average
Temperature
, How do we know a biological
change is caused by climate?
Correlational Patterns
– Long-term patterns --- Does biological change match climate
trends in direction and magnitude?
– “natural experiments” --- does population respond to
extreme weather events and climate years?
Field Manipulations of temperature and fitness
– impacts on behavior (foraging, mating)
– impacts on growth and fecundity
Laboratory Experiments
– temperature survival thresholds
, IPCC 2001: 8 Biological studies in USA
Camille Parmesan
Integrative Biology, University of Texas at Austin
,* Global Temperatures are Rising
* Plants and Animals are Changing WHERE
they live and WHEN they live
Global
Average
Temperature
, How do we know a biological
change is caused by climate?
Correlational Patterns
– Long-term patterns --- Does biological change match climate
trends in direction and magnitude?
– “natural experiments” --- does population respond to
extreme weather events and climate years?
Field Manipulations of temperature and fitness
– impacts on behavior (foraging, mating)
– impacts on growth and fecundity
Laboratory Experiments
– temperature survival thresholds
, IPCC 2001: 8 Biological studies in USA
