The impact of climate change on Australia’s unique plants, animals and ecosystems will cause extinctions and lost ecosystem services and require new ways of thinking about biodiversity conservation, finds Australia’s national science agency.
Conducted by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, CSIRO, the study modeled 100 percent of Australia’s land mass and did detailed ecological analyses of four priority biomes, covering around 80 percent of Australia.
Climate change is likely to start to transform some of Australia’s natural landscapes by 2030, said lead researcher Dr. Michael Dunlop. By 2070, the ecological impacts are likely to be very significant and widespread.
Many of the environments our plants and animals currently exist in will disappear from the continent, he said. Our grandchildren are likely to experience landscapes that are very different to the ones we have known.
The CSIRO researchers analyzed in detail climate impacts and adaptation options in four biomes: hummock grasslands of the arid interior of Australia; tropical savanna woodlands and grasslands; temperate grasslands and grassy woodlands; and southeastern Australia’s sclerophyll forests, which are open eucalypt woodlands.
The study suggests the Australian community and scientists need to start a rethink of what it means to conserve biodiversity, as managing threatened species and stopping ecological change becomes increasingly difficult.
We need to give biodiversity the greatest opportunity to adapt naturally in a changing and variable environment rather than trying to prevent ecological change, Dr. Dunlop said.
Australia contains one million different native species. More than 80 percent of the country’s flowering plants, mammals, reptiles and frogs are unique to Australia, along with most of its freshwater fish and almost half of its birds.
But under pressure from habitat change, overexploitation, pollution, invasive alien species and climate change, Australia’s biodiversity is already in steep decline, possibly faster than anywhere else in the world.
Australia has the worst mammal extinction record in the world 27 mammals have become extinct in the last 200 years.
In addition, more than 1,500 mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and plants are listed as threatened with extinction under federal legislation. The Australian government also has identified 3,000 ecosystems facing extinction.
2012 Environment News Service