Arctic plants, insects, birds and land mammals are experiencing wide ranging and diverse effects from climate change. The timing of key life events, changing habitats, and the introduction of new predators and potentially new diseases are among the impacts described in a new CBMP report based on long-term biodiversity monitoring from around the Arctic.

Species from southern ecosystems, such as red fox, moose, and voles are moving into the Arctic, and are expected to push Arctic species northwards, creating an “Arctic squeeze.”

Although the population-level effects are unknown at this time, changing frequency, intensity, and timing of extreme weather events such as winter rain and thaws make it hard for some species such as lemmings and caribou/reindeer to access food. Increased frequency of heavy rain events, and warm temperatures causing massive blackfly outbreaks, have killed Arctic peregrine falcon chicks.

Changes cascading through the ecosystem and may affect services that nature provides for people, such as pollination, nutrient cycling, and food. Changes in culturally-important food resources have implications for the food security and cultures of Indigenous Peoples and Arctic residents.

The State of the Arctic Terrestrial Biodiversity Report – third in CBMP's "State of the Arctic" series – was developed with by the CBMP-Terrestrial group with nearly 200 contributors. See the full report, video, summary of key findings, and data.

The Circumpolar Seabird Expert Group (CBird), within CBMP-Marine, and the Marine Mammals Expert Network released their first update reports on eight seabird and 11 Arctic endemic marine mammal species since the 2017 State of the Arctic Marine Biodiversity Report (SAMBR).

The Marine mammal group found that direct and indirect impacts of climate warming continue to be the primary threat to marine mammals in the Arctic; and that insufficient monitoring regionally and across taxonomic groups, makes it impossible to present a holistic assessment of status and trends of Arctic endemic mammals; trends for 66% of stocks are currently unknown.

CBird reports that all eight species monitored in the SAMBR continue to be impacted by climate-driven changes to food supplies and retreating sea ice, and possibly fisheries bycatch in some locations. Data from 2016–2019 show that broad population declines continue to be recorded in the Atlantic Arctic, where monitoring data tend to be most complete, particularly for kittiwakes and both species of murres. Common eiders, although generally doing well throughout all regions, changed from increasing to decreasing in two regions of the Atlantic Arctic. Some previously declining small populations of ivory gulls now appear stable, even while larger populations have declined in the Kara and Laptev Seas.

CBird representatives and collaborators also worked with CAFF's Arctic Migratory Birds Initiative (AMBI) to develop a series of reports on seabirds and plastics:

• Review of plastic pollution policies of Arctic countries in relation to seabirds
• Plastic ingestion by seabirds in the circumpolar Arctic: A review
• Developing a program to monitor plastic pollution in seabirds in the pan-Arctic region

Implementing CBMP monitoring plans in the field

Working with INTERACT – the International Network for Terrestrial Research and Monitoring in the Arctic – CBMP developed an online tool to guide users through the stages needed to implement CBMP Freshwater and Terrestrial monitoring plans at INTERACT stations.

This tool will be updated based on new monitoring developments, priorities, and lessons learned. A FEC Search Tool allows the user to search through the Focal Ecosystem Components (FEC) identified in the Freshwater and Terrestrial Monitoring.

Extreme events and their impacts on Arctic freshwater and terrestrial ecosystems

CBMP is reviewing literature on the effects of extreme weather events on biodiversity in Arctic freshwater and terrestrial ecosystems. Extreme events are a key facet of climate change research, with impacts on biodiversity expected to be particularly severe in the Arctic. Scientific research has focused primarily on the impacts of single events, with less attention given to long-term recovery. Recommendations were made to bridge current knowledge gaps by taking advantage of the CBMP; however there is a need to:

• better define what is considered extreme in terms of events and ecological impacts,
• move beyond single-impact studies and spatial scales of observation, and
• consider predictive modelling to address ecosystem-level impacts.

A journal article is forthcoming.