European Mammals Make Like Gérard Depardieu, Flee to Russia

New research shows that climate change will expand habitats across Northern Europe for many mammals.


By 2080, Russia might witness a vast mammalian invasion, as sub-arctic European animals flee global warming and adapt to a thawing tundra. New textbooks may need to accommodate never-before-seen communities of species as climate change pits predator against predator beyond the Russian steppe. That’s what a group of Swedish researchers predict in a new climate change study published in the journal, PloS One.

“North Western Russia will be some kind of hotspot of species richness,” said Christer Nilsson, an ecology professor, via Skype from Umeå University in Sweden. “Species will be on the move and there will be new combinations of species.”

Red and fallow deer, wild boar, the Eurasian badger, rabbits, mice and beaver will all be on the move as new tracts of habitable land open up.

Fallow Deer

Fallow deer, heading to Russia John Kent/Flickr

In a surprising twist, Professor Nilsson and his team found that most species in the Barents Region, which includes the northern half of Norway, Sweden, Finland and a big chunk of North Western Russian, will actually be favored by climate change. Forty-three out of the 61 animals studied will expand and shift their “ranges”—or habitats—mostly in a north-easterly direction, sometimes traveling hundreds of miles.

Predator Map

Suitable area for the tundra vole and its suitability for potential predators. “A” shows 2000 and “B” shows one 2080 scenario. Anouschka R. Hof, Roland Jansson, Christer Nilsson

But no one can predict how all the animals will interact in their new, climate-changed world, and far from helping animals, climate change might force new, and deadly, interactions: “Predators might be in contact with new prey,” Nilsson said.

There might be tough times ahead for the poor little tundra vole, for example, which will need to elude more foxes, badgers, pine martens, stoats, weasels, polecats, and mink. That’s because right now, only one percent of the area Nilsson studied is suitable for three or more predators; by 2080, that could increase to nearly 40 percent. That means turf warfare for the mountain hare and the European hare, as both vie for similar habitats.

Red fox

Two major caveats exist in the report. The findings assume that humans won’t—as we are so often wont to do—get in the way of the mass movement by fragmenting animals’ habitats. And the findings only apply to the “generalists” that can adapt to changing conditions. Those that require very specific habits—the “specialists” such as the wolverine and the Siberian flying squirrel—are going to have a much tougher time in a warmed world.

Even so, the report found something encouraging: No extinctions predicted in the area surveyed. “We couldn’t find any evidence that any species will disappear, given the climate change predictions we’ve used,” Nilsson said. Nevertheless, vulnerability of those already threatened may increase due to the introduction of new competing or predatory species.

Naturally, a climate report that shows even a glimmer of hope can be latched onto and overblown. Fox News uses Nilsson’s study to declare the “poster animal” of the climate movement, the polar bear, totally OK: Global Warming Helps Polar Bears.”

Polar bears are north of the area the researchers studied, and are not mentioned at all in the report.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate