Peregrine falcons perched atop towering skyscrapers. Coyotes caught on camera playing in someone’s backyard. The pale green wings of a cabbage white butterfly perched on a flower blossom. Urban areas are awash in wildlife that faces growing pressures due to climate change, according to a study published today in PLOS ONE. The research, which looked at climate impacts on everything from mammals to insects in 60 of the most populous cities across the US and Canada, found that a warming world is moving many animals out of their historical geographic ranges and into new ones.
“Within a few years, the animals that you feed at your bird feeder might look very different,” said Alessandro Filazzola, the study’s lead author, who completed the research while he was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Toronto Mississauga’s Centre for Urban Environments.
