How Does Climate Change Affect Biodiversity

The Impacts of Climate Change on Species

This paper seeks to research the study of climate change and its effects on biodiversity. This will be done by first understanding what climate change is and what the different effects are. Once this is understood, it will be easier to apply this knowledge to the study of biodiversity and how species are affected. Real life examples of different species that are affected will be mentioned and explained.

Climate change is a reoccurring issue in our world that has been observed and studied extensively. Firstly, what exactly is climate change? Climate change is when the usual weather that is found in an area changes. This can be seen as a change of precipitation in an area or the change in temperature.

One factor is the sun’s energy levels which has an 11 year cycle of small changes in the intensity. Earth’s tilted axis and rotations also changes the climate because at times, the sun is closer or farther away from certain areas of earth’s surface.

Climate change has major effects to our world that a lot of people don’t realize. Global warming is a major threat for the habitat in the Arctic. The Arctic is warming twice as fast as the rest of the world because the shiny snow and ice is reflecting more of the sun’s energy but as the ice and snow disappears, the water and rock are absorbing the heat and this is known as the albedo effect. As the glaciers, snow and ice melt, sea levels will rise which can cause erosion and destroy habitats. Also, the Arctic habitat hosts many species itself, such as polar bears, arctic foxes, and walruses. Without these land masses, hunting, mating and resting are harder to do which results in the species dying out. There are also many droughts that are occurring which affects many species including humans. Many ponds that contain wildlife are drying up and many freshwater bodies are being depleted. Not only are animals being affected by this but