Severe decline in Arctic reindeer could shatter the tundra ecosystem
Climate change is severely impacting the Arctic tundra, with the reindeer population experiencing a dramatic decline.
This keystone species is crucial for maintaining the ecosystem's balance and its reduction could have far-reaching effects.
Research indicates that if current trends continue, the reindeer's habitat and population will significantly decrease by the end of the century, threatening the region's ecological and human communities.
What would you call someone who says: “This wide, frigid expanse is the Arctic tundra.”
It occupies the northernmost part of the world and is characterised by extreme cold temperatures, scant vegetation that includes shrubs, liverworts, grasses and reindeer moss and a layer of permanently frozen soil called permafrost.
The rapidly declining reindeer (or caribou) population, courtesy of climate change, might have serious repercussions for the region's ecosystem. According to a research article published in the journal Science Advances, the Arctic tundra's keystone species, Rangifer tarandus, is facing a severe existential threat from climate change and has already lost two-thirds of its population in the last three decades.
This is concerning news for both reindeer populations and the tundra as a whole, as the species’ activities regulate the structure and function of climate-sensitive tundra ecosystems. They have also been instrumental in advancing human population expansion into the Arctic and the far north.
Reindeer are a climate-resilient species and have survived other natural environmental changes. But the current human-induced climate change is the most recent and the most dire in their 21,000-year-old Pleistocene existence.
A team of experts from the universities of Adelaide and Copenhagen analysed the species’ DNA to study their reactions to past events and forecast their future prospects. The results paint a grim picture. The article states that, in a “business as usual” scenario, the Holarctic range of the reindeer — that is, its population in the Northern Hemisphere — will shrink by 58 per cent and its geographic area will contract by 46 per cent by 2100.
In North America, the situation is even more severe: the caribou population decline is pegged at 84 per cent, with a reduction in geographic area of 71 per cent.
The solutions to reverse or curb this troubling trend are to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase investment in conservation efforts.
Rangifer tarandus is vital not just for tundra biodiversity and ecosystems but also for the well-being of the Arctic communities that depend on it.