Up To 30% Of Pacific Brant - Goose Species - Wintering In Alaska Rather Than Migrating - ENS

[hatrack]

RESTON, Virginia, September 10, 2009 (ENS) - As the climate warms, Arctic-nesting geese called Pacific brant are choosing to winter in Alaska instead of migrating to Mexico as they used to do, finds a study led by scientists with the U.S. Geological Survey, USGS. Until recently, 90 percent of Pacific brant wintered in Mexico, but now as many as to 30 percent are opting to spend their winters in Alaska instead, the research shows.

"This increase in wintering numbers of brant in Alaska coincides with a general warming of temperatures in the North Pacific and Bering Sea," said David Ward, the lead author of the study and a USGS researcher at the Alaska Science Center. "This suggests that environmental conditions have changed for one of the northernmost-wintering populations of geese."

Although records are sparse, fewer than 3,000 brant were detected wintering in Alaska before 1977, a number that has jumped to as many as 40,000 birds now. The species is "of federal management concern" because its numbers have been declining steadily across its entire range since the early 1960s.

The shift in climate to a warmer phase after 1976 had a well-documented effect on the abundance and distribution of marine species, including walleye pollock, Pacific cod, northern fur seals, and seabirds known as thick-billed murres.

EDIT

http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/sep2009/2009-09-10-095.asp

[Warpy]

1. Critters that adapt will survive

It's always been that way. Critters that can't or won't adapt will perish.

It looks like the geese are adapting.

[joshcryer]

2. Not just that, evolution plays a role. Geese that are better adapted (or mutated) will survive this.

Their offspring will usher in a new type of arctic geese which doesn't migrate.

[madrchsod]

3. we had a few geese and ducks wintering in northern illinois in the early 60`s

and now there`s hundreds just with in a radius 15 miles of my town