Centre for Urban Environments, University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, Ontario, Canada.
Apex Resource Management Solutions, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
PLoS One. 2024 Mar 27;19(3):e0299217. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0299217. eCollection 2024.
Human experiences with nature are important for our culture, economy, and health. Anthropogenically-driven climate change is causing widespread shifts in biodiversity and resident urban wildlife are no exception. We modelled over 2,000 animal species to predict how climate change will impact terrestrial wildlife within 60 Canadian and American cities. We found evidence of an impending great urban shift where thousands of species will disappear across the selected cities, being replaced by new species, or not replaced at all. Effects were largely species-specific, with the most negatively impacted taxa being amphibians, canines, and loons. These predicted shifts were consistent across scenarios of greenhouse gas emissions, but our results show that the severity of change will be defined by our action or inaction to mitigate climate change. An impending massive shift in urban wildlife will impact the cultural experiences of human residents, the delivery of ecosystem services, and our relationship with nature.
人类与自然的互动对我们的文化、经济和健康至关重要。人为引起的气候变化正在导致生物多样性的广泛变化，城市居民的野生动物也不例外。我们对 2000 多种动物物种进行建模，以预测气候变化将如何影响 60 个加拿大和美国城市的陆地野生动物。我们发现了即将发生的重大城市转变的证据，在选定的城市中，数千个物种将消失，被新物种取代，或者根本没有被取代。这些影响在很大程度上是特定于物种的，受影响最大的类群是两栖动物、犬科动物和潜鸟。这些预测的变化在温室气体排放的情景中是一致的，但我们的研究结果表明，气候变化的严重程度将取决于我们采取行动或不采取行动来缓解气候变化。城市野生动物即将发生大规模转变，这将影响人类居民的文化体验、生态系统服务的提供以及我们与自然的关系。
