UK climate change forecasts ‘improving’

Forecasts which predict how climate change will affect UK birds are improving, new research suggests.

Models have been developed in recent years to predict how the area where a bird species lives – known as its range – will change as the climate does.

The accuracy of these models had never been tested, but the new research by the University of Exeter and the University of Adelaide found they are working well.

“Our findings are a real win for bird conservation in the UK and beyond,” said Dr Regan Early, of the University of Exeter.

“This is because we now have tools that not only better forecast climate-driven range movements, but can be used to target conservation management resources more effectively.”

Dr Early was part of a team of scientists who tested how accurately different types of ecological models predicted the contraction and expansion of the ranges of 20 UK bird species over the last 40 years.

They found that the latest generation of models, which directly account for important ecological responses to climate change, do much better at forecasting recent range shifts.