Washington: Even the wildest part of Amazon who is not touched by humanity is being influenced by anthropogenic climate change, according to new research.
More hot conditions, more drier for the past four decades reduced the body size of rainforest birds while increasing their wings, a study published in the journal Science Advances Friday.
These changes are considered a response to nutritional and physiological challenges, especially during the dry season of June to November.
“In this pure Amazon rainforest, we see the global effects of climate change caused by the community,” ViteK Jirinec, an ecological partner at the Center for Integral Ecology Research, said in a statement.
Jirinec and colleagues analyzed data collected in more than 15,000 birds captured, measured, weighed, and marked for 40 years of field work.
They found that almost all birds became lighter since the 1980s.
Most species lose an average of two percent of body weight every decade, which means that the species of birds that will weigh 30 grams in the 1980s will now averaged 27.6 grams.
Data is not related to certain sites but somewhat collected from a large number of rainforests, which means that phenomenon is everywhere.
Overall, scientists investigated 77 species whose habitat ranged from the cool and dark forest floor to the middle of the sun and warm – the middle layer of forest vegetation.
The birds at the highest part of Midstory, the most flying and more exposed heat, have the most obvious change in body weight and the size of the team of the team hypothesis is adaptation to energy pressure – for example the decrease in the availability of fruit and insect resources – and also for thermal stress .
Longer wings, and mass-to-wing ratios are reduced, produce more efficient flights – similar to how gliders with a slim body and long wings can soar with less energy.
A higher mass ratio requires birds to pack faster to stay high, use more energy and produce more heat metabolism.
These species “are quite tuned, so when everyone in the population is a few gram smaller, it’s important,” said Co-author Philip Stouffer from Louisiana State University.
How good Amazon bird deals with increasingly hot and more dry conditions in the future it remains an open question.
The authors add the same effect they record likely it would be true of other species throughout the world living in an extreme environment.
“It’s undoubtedly happening throughout and maybe not only with birds,” Stouffer said.