Climate change changes temperature and rainfall patterns, particularly in tropical environments, resulting in consequences for the persistence of wildlife populations. However, the complexities of the effects of changing temperature and rainfall on tropical mammals is not well studied. Together with our colleagues, we studied the demography of the gray mouse lemur in western Madagascar using data collected by the German Primate Center between 1994 and 2020. Climate trends in the lemur’s environment show declining rainfall over the wet season and increasing temperatures in the dry season. These climate trends, we found, led to decreased survival rates as well as increased reproductive rates. The competing demographic trends have prevented population collapse, but have destabilized the population by further speeding up their life cycle which was already one of the fastest among primates. Population projections into the next five decades suggest that when recently observed temperature and rainfall conditions persist, the population size of lemurs may continue to fluctuate, putting the population at increased risk of extinction. Our results show how, even though short-lived mammal species with high reproductive rates are expected to rapidly adapt to changes in their environment, such species can still face threats of extinction from climate change.
Link to the article: Ozgul A, Fichtel C, Paniw M, Kappeler PM (2023) Destabilising effect of climate change on the persistence of a short-lived primate. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA
