In a warming world, it’s better to be a small mammal than a bird

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https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2021/02/warming-world-its-better-be-small-mammal-bird

Source:  By Elizabeth Pennisi, Science Magazine. 

Excerpt: In the early 1900s, Joseph Grinnell traversed the wilds of California in his Ford Model T truck, meticulously surveying its fauna. Along the Californian coast, he trapped pocket mice and watched condors soar; in the Mojave Desert, his team chronicled American kestrels swooping for insects and caught cactus mice hiding among rocks. Now, by comparing Grinnell’s data with modern surveys, ecologists have shown that climate change has not been an equal opportunity stressor. As the Mojave warmed by about 2°C over the past century, bird numbers and diversity declined dramatically, but small mammals like little pocket mice are holding their own. The survivors’ secret seems to be a nocturnal lifestyle and an ability to escape the heat by burrowing, the team reports today in Science. Until now, researchers have often assumed climate change challenges mammals and birds in similar ways, because both need to maintain their body temperature.... 

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