Evidence of the impact of climate change on our collective environment has been highlighted by many scientific studies in over the past two few decades. However, there are still many gaps in our understanding of the consequences of global warming and in particular of its effect on biodiversity. Although international communities (e.g. IUCN) often focus on range-restricted species in the polar regions, another often overlooked ecozone are is high alpine habitats, or “sky islands”. Sky islands have large proportions of endemics and their mountain-top locations leave inhabitants with no little opportunity to move to higher (and thus cooler) habitats as their current habitats continue to warm. 

The Cape Rockjumper - a South African endemic bird species – is suffering population declines that are heavily correlated with habitat warming within its current range. Cape Rockjumpers are restricted in their distribution to the mountain slopes of the Western and Eastern Cape provinces: the “sky islands” of south-west South Africa. My goal was to try and find the mechanism for this decline, in the hopes we can find a way to bolster not only Rockjumper populations, but those of other similarly affected species.

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To do this, I examined Rockjumper behaviour, reproduction, genetics, and physiology. In general, the biggest culprit seemed to be the interacting effects of climate and predation on breeding success. Nestlings struggled at high temperatures, with parents not able to provide sufficient food at higher temperatures. This made sense, as we found adults spend less time foraging at high temperatures, when they're spending time resting in shade. At these higher temperatures they also dealt with more predation from snakes.