Western approach to conservation where we 'save' small patches of pristine habitat is not enough: "Overall, these results showcase how human-driven climate change is already reshaping biodiversity globally and may explain reported declines of birds in undisturbed tropical habitats."
in my opinion conservation (bird and otherwise) must include a land back approach where we adjust our entire worldview and relations towards animals and the land. climate change makes this more stark but this has always been true since colonialism started. saving birds means destroying capitalism.
findings are also particularly pertinent given recent documentation of declining tropical bird populations, even in undisturbed habitats. The source of such declines have been noted as unknown, yet they are of a similar order of magnitude to our estimates of the impacts of intensified heat extremes
... in two relatively undisturbed rainforests in Panama and the Amazon, abundance declined by over 50% for the majority of bird species between 1977 and 2020 and between 2003 and 2022.
Therefore, our results support a likely mechanism behind these declines in tropical bird populations in undisturbed habitats and imply that intensifying heat extremes are degrading abundance more widely across the tropics