Michael G. Anderson Andrew R Blaustein Virginia Burkett Benjamin Felzer Brad Griffith Jeff Price Terry L. Root D.B. Inkley 2004 <p>It is widely accepted by the scientific community that the&nbsp;earth, which has always experienced climate variation, is&nbsp;now undergoing a period of rapid climate change that is&nbsp;enhanced by anthropogenic atmospheric carbon enrichment&nbsp;during the past 100 years. These climatic changes are&nbsp;accelerating and projections for the next 100 years indicate&nbsp;extensive warming in most (but not all) areas, changing&nbsp;patterns of precipitation, and a significant acceleration of sea&nbsp;level rise. Other likely components of ongoing climate&nbsp;change include changes in season lengths, decreasing range&nbsp;of nighttime versus daytime temperatures, declining&nbsp;snowpack, and increasing frequency and intensity of severe&nbsp;weather events. The many components of climate change,&nbsp;and especially the unprecedented rapid rate of change, are&nbsp;just as important as increasing temperatures.&nbsp;Wildlife species are closely adapted to their environments&nbsp;and readily respond to climate variation. However, as&nbsp;discussed in this technical review, the climate change now&nbsp;underway has extensive potential to affect wildlife&nbsp;throughout North America, either directly or indirectly&nbsp;through responses to changing habitat conditions. When<br>considered in combination with other factors (e.g., pollution,&nbsp;ozone depletion, urbanization, etc.), the potential effect is&nbsp;even greater. The effects of climate change on populations&nbsp;and range distributions of wildlife are expected to be species&nbsp;specific and highly variable, with some effects considered&nbsp;negative and others considered positive. In North America&nbsp;the ranges of habitats and wildlife are predicted to generally&nbsp;move northward as temperatures increase. Variations in this&nbsp;overall pattern will be dependent upon specific local&nbsp;conditions, changing precipitation patterns, and the response&nbsp;of different species to different components of climate&nbsp;change. It follows that the structure of plant–animal&nbsp;communities will also change.&nbsp;Ignoring climate change is likely to increasingly result in&nbsp;failure to reach wildlife management objectives. Wildlife&nbsp;managers need to become knowledgeable about climate&nbsp;change, ways to cope with it, and ways to take advantage of it.&nbsp;Management options currently available include protecting&nbsp;coastal wetlands to allow for sea level rise, reducing the risks&nbsp;to wildlife from potential catastrophic events, adjusting yield&nbsp;and harvest models, accounting for known climatic variations,&nbsp;and taking climate change into consideration when selecting&nbsp;the location and other characteristics of conservation areas.&nbsp;Wildlife managers also need to expect the unexpected and&nbsp;reduce nonclimate stressors on ecosystems. Overall, wildlife&nbsp;managers can minimize negative impacts to wildlife and take&nbsp;advantage of positive aspects by planning ahead and&nbsp;employing adaptive management. </p> application/pdf en Wildlife Society Global climate change and wildlife in North America reports