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On July 30th, 2004, a Scottish newspaper produced a report that shocked the country.
Hundreds of thousands of seabirds, they reported, had failed to breed and the species was disappearing.
The cause of these deaths, scientists believed, must have been global warming.
In the last twenty years, the temperature of the North Sea has increased by 2℃.
This has caused the plankton in the area to move north in search of cold water.
As a result, new generations of sand eels, which feed on the plankton, cannot hind food.
Because of this, there has been a decrease in the sand eel population, sand eels, in turn, are the main food of many seabirds.
Their near-disappearance has caused widespread starvation among the birds, who are now failing to breed.
Food Chain: Plankton→Sand ells →Seabirds
Scotland’s 2000 study reported that many kinds of seabirds have produced almost no young.
For example, the 6,800 pairs of seagulls on the Shetland Islands would normally produce hundreds of chicks, but they had almost none at all.
Recent studies estimate that about 1,150 bird species, or 12% of all birds, are in danger of disappearing.
This number has increased by almost 400 since 1994, and another 600 to 900 could soon be added.
What is happening?
Global warming is a threat to carefully balanced ecosystem, not only in Scotland, but all over the world.
Species have adapted to certain climatic conditions, which are now changing.
As summer temperatures slowly increase and winters become drier, plants and animals may either move north to cooler areas, or die out
.
With the increase in temperature, species that pupate or hibernate may emerge early to find that the plants that they feed on have not changed their own calendars.
The result will be that animals find it more difficult, or even impossible, to find food.
One example of this was in 1989.
The early emergences of Edith’s checkerspot butterflies in California caused the death of the entire local butterfly population.
The butterflies must have hatched early from their pupae because the flowers they needed had not yet begun to bloom, the butterflies starved.
Losing an entire population like this may have had several consequences.
For one thing, birds and other creatures must have looked for butterflies to eat, but never found them.
Doesn’t this remind you of the chain of events set off in Scotland’s sea?