Shrink: Birds’ reaction to climate change (but bigger-brained birds shrink less)

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Birds with bigger brains don’t shrink as much, compared to birds with smaller brains.

As climate change affect many living beings and birds do not escape. One study published a week ago, focused on the adaptation of birds to these changes in climate. The research was carried out by experts from Washington University in St. Louis, in the United States of America.

The researchers analyzed the corpses of tens of thousands of birds that die in Chicago, when they do not escape the local skyscrapers during their migration process (between Canada and countries in Central and South America). We analyzed about 70 thousand birds who died in Chicago between 1978 and 2016.

North American migratory birds are shrinking, as a reaction to climate change. But this study demonstrates that birds that have bigger brainsin relation to body size, are not shrinking as muchcompared to birds with smaller brains.

The analysis, published in the scientific journal Ecology Letters, sought precisely to understand and identify a relationship between cognition and animal response to human-induced climate change.

Justin Baldwin, a doctoral student at the University of Washington, explained: “As temperatures rise, body size decreases. But species with larger brains are declining less than species with small brains.”

Justin noted that many experts consider relative brain size to be an indicator of behavioral flexibility in birds. That is, the size of the brain is related to learning abilitywith memory, with life expectancy and with a more stable population dynamics.

Therefore, a bird with a larger brain “may be able to reduce its exposure to higher temperatures, looking for microhabitats with lower temperatures, for example.”

However, it is not known why the birds are shrinking. What is known is that this shrinkage can harm the birdwhich is more vulnerable and more likely to fall victim to a predator.

Carlos Botero, a professor at the University of Washington, added to the CNN: “In this study, one of the first things that strikes me is that we can already see that the climate change is creating a disproportionate effect in species that are less able to cope with environmental change through their behavior”.

“That doesn’t mean climate change isn’t affecting smart birds. What this suggests is that the climate change could have a much stronger effect on less intelligent birds“Botero warned.