The Impact of Climate Change on Habitat Degradation

The aim of this assessment is to analyze effects of the issue habitats degradation, invasive species, forest fires, population growth or urbanization, economic growth on the flora and fauna in general and how climate change has intensified the seriousness of the issues in the lives of human beings, plants and animal species of the world. Climate change in the current environmental setting is more intense to affect the ecological system of the earth that this can lead to complete destruction of lives. It has affected natural weather system of the earth that has led to habitats degradation of the animals as well as the humans, invasive species, increasing forest fires, pollution and all other climatic issue on the earth. There are differed social and economic problems related to this issue of climate that has forced the human being to face the wrath of nature.

Earth is a home to various types of animal and plant species who completely depend on nature for their living. They need specific temperature and habitat to get proper food and survive (Hing et al., 2017).  However due to various reasons like deforestation and urbanization, habitat degradation of the animals and plants have increased. Climate change however has aggregated such issue more and affected their existence so severely that the animals and plant who cannot adapt with type changing weather are gradually getting extinct from the earth. Each of the plant and animal species evolve for thriving in its own specific ecological niche but climate change has strong effect on the natural habitats disrupting their specific living conditions (Moseby, Lollback & Lynch, 2018). Some of the animal and plant species are more adaptable with the changing climate and changing living conditions. For example, rats and dogs can adapt themselves with any weather condition but Koala bears cannot survive without eucalyptus and pandas need bamboo. Human caused climate change has altered natural temperature, sea level and precipitation that has started to wipe out the habitats and compel some of the birds and animal scopes to migrate.

Invasive species are another threat to the native wildlife which can be any type of living organism that is not native to that particular ecosystem therefore cause harm. These species can harm the ecology of that place, environment, human health or even economy. These species grow as well as reproduce quickly but spread aggressively (Pacioni et al., 2017). These cause harm other species hence referred to as invasive species. Sometimes through intentional and unintentional human activities, these species can enter the new ecosystem. Now with the change of climate, the number of such species are growing. For example, lake trout are native to the Great Lakes but referred to be the invasive species for the Yellowstone lake because they are tough competition to the cutthroat trout of the native ecosystem.

Invasive Species: A Threat to Native Wildlife

Forest fires is not beneficial for the wildlife as these are unplanned and damaging. However most of the wildfire starts due to human activities. In case the wildfire starts in a dry season it does not only affect the vegetation of the place but also degrades the stream water quality which indirectly ruin the ecosystem of the place (Settele et al., 2015). The animals and plants are burnt and killed by the wildfire. This a very common phenomenon in Australian forests. Some of the animals like deer, elk and kangaroos can escape the harm of forest fire but the smaller animals like snakes, foxes and squirrels cannot escape. The birds can fly away but their nests and eggs are burnt. Frequent forest fire affects the wildlife to get injured, dehydrated and malnourished which can be the reason of extinction of many plant species as they cannot escape the fire. Since the habitats of the animals and birds get destroyed by the fire, they spend more time to search for food, water and shelter which make them more vulnerable to extinction (Pacifici et al.,2015). Climate change has aggregated this problem as the dryness in the weather is increasing which is leading the forests to be affected more intensely by the fire.

Population growth is another factor that is closely linked with the climate change. Due to increased population the need for urbanization is increasing. This is the reason why the forests are being cut down to make space for the skyscrapers, roads and other elements of cities and town (Melillo, Richmond & Yohe, 2014). This is firstly affecting the plant species in that region. As the forest life is affected, the home to the animals and bird species are also harmed. They become homeless, some of the species are killed by the human and machinery and others are killed due to scarcity or food and water. Thus, a complete land ecosystem gets devastated by the urbanization initiative. It is related to climate change of the earth as the human population pollute the natural air, water and land quality which affect the native animal and plant species (Kerr et al., 2015). Over population of the cities creates problems of insufficient water, waste disposal and demands of urban environments which affect the health of the non-human species and gradually push them to death.

 Economic growth effects the flora and fauna of a place. For example, the agro-based countries which depend upon the export of their productions to the other countries or the gulf nations which depend upon the export of their national oil or gas to attain economic growth, depend largely upon the climate change of the place. These countries follow the method of deforestation to increase agricultural lands as well as mines which reduce the variety of plant and animal species of that place. Due to climate change, precipitation level reduces affecting the production of crops and increase the mount of earthquake level affecting the mining business which affect economic growth more intensely.

Forest Fires and their Devastating Effects on Wildlife

Northern Bettong is very small rat-kangaroo species found in the region of Queensland, Australia. This is one of the rarest species found only in this country in the whole world. The reasons of climate change are far reaching impact on this particular species as this is sensitive to weather change and food habit. Among the present threats that leads to the decline of Northern Bettong are the threat of the predators most importantly the foxes and feral cats in this region. In addition to this, the human activities as well as forest fires have posed threat to this endanger species (Woinarski, Burbidge & Harrison, 2018). This animal species has very special diet like underground fungi during the wet season of the year and in dry season this switches to fleshy stems of lilies and Cockatoo grass, fruits, seeds and herbs. Due to climate change, the wet season is being reduced in Australia which is compelling the species to move towards the wetter part of the country. In this process of migration, a huge number of Northern Bettong has been abolishing.

The data collected by Bateman, Abell-Davis and Johnson (2011), regarding how temperature rise have fastened up the decline process of this particular species reveals that the high ranging temperature affect the production of truffles on which the species only live and this can only be found in the wet season and wet part of the country. Due to climate change, drought has become frequent which and reducing the food amount for this particular species.

According to, Iucnredlist.org (2018), the number of northern Bettong in the Australian forests are only 5000-10000 which identifies it to be endangered. The effects of climate change on Northern Bettong has incurred researchers and biologists to identify the process and to prevent these problems so that this endangered species can be restored. To Woinarski, Burbidge and Harrison (2018), the adequacy and extent of this species in Australian forest is necessary as this is required to spread the spores of eucalyptus plants and spores of the fungi thus helping the ecosystem to survive but if this species extinct, entire ecology of the place will be lost.

Australia is a home to huge number of birds, reptiles, mammals and amphibians Along with Northern Bettong, other possible species such as sea turtles, coral reefs, vaquita, Christmas Island flying-fox, mountain pygmy possum and the birds like helmeted honeyeater and orange-bellied Parrot might get threatened due to climate change. Along with these amphibians such as Booroolong frog, armoured mistfrog and arthropods like Sydney Hawk also are endangered species of Australia.

Population Growth: A Factor Linked to Climate Change

In order to save the species from being extinct, proper adaptation options and management plans needed to be initiated. Firstly, the restoration of a conservation-oriented fire regime is needed in which the amount of wet sclerophyll forests will be increased in the Queensland area.  to bring the numbers under control. In order to curb the number of invasive species the people transport from one place to the other need to be careful so that they do not carry any plants or animals not native to the place. Most importantly, the emission of greenhouse gasses needs to be curbed so that the effect of global climate change can be mitigated. Through the reforestation method in the urban areas and investing more on creating sanctuaries the animals living in the forests can be secured. Through proper legislation the pollution level will also be reduced which will mandate to reduce the global warming thus climate change.

Therefore, it can be concluded that the effects of climate change on the given species is far reaching and putting Australian biodiversity under risk and always under stress. The uncontrolled pollution, deforestation and urbanization are the main causes of global climate change. This is affecting the temperature of a land as well as precipitation. Therefore, the plant species are not getting ample advantages to grow up hence fast moving to extinction. Depending on the forest the animal and bird species are also in danger as deforestation leading to lose of habitat, water and food. This is ignited by forest fire. Therefore, the government organizational and other agencies are working together to manage such issues so that the species get security to live on this earth.

References:

Bateman, B., Abell-Davis, S., & Johnson, C. (2011). Climate-driven variation in food availability between the core and range edge of the endangered northern bettong (Bettongia tropica). Australian Journal Of Zoology, 59(3), 177. doi: 10.1071/zo11079

Hing, S., Jones, K. L., Rafferty, C., Thompson, R. A., Narayan, E. J., & Godfrey, S. S. (2017). Wildlife in the line of fire: evaluating the stress physiology of a critically endangered Australian marsupial after bushfire. Australian Journal of Zoology, 64(6), 385-389.

Iucnredlist.org. (2018). Bettongia tropica (Northern Bettong). Retrieved from https://www.iucnredlist.org/details/2787/0

Kerr, J.T., Pindar, A., Galpern, P., Packer, L., Potts, S.G., Roberts, S.M., Rasmont, P., Schweiger, O., Colla, S.R., Richardson, L.L., & Wagner, D.L. (2015). Climate change impacts on bumblebees converge across continents. Science, 349(6244), pp.177-180.

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Pacioni, C., Williams, M. R., Lacy, R. C., Spencer, P. B., & Wayne, A. F. (2017). Predators and genetic fitness: key threatening factors for the conservation of a bettong species. Pacific Conservation Biology, 23(2), 200-212.

Settele, J., Scholes, R., Betts, R.A., Bunn, S., Leadley, P., Nepstad, D., Overpeck, J.T., Taboada, M.A., Fischlin, A., Moreno, J.M., & Root, T. (2015). Terrestrial and inland water systems. In Climate Change 2014 Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability: Part A: Global and Sectoral Aspects. Cambridge University Press.

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