Building Resilient Habitats > Wild Legacy

Building Resilient Habitats

To survive global warming, wildlife and native plants need RESILIENT HABITATS.

Good news! Victory at Tejon Ranch: Sierra Club helps protect 240,000 acres of wild California land. Read more here.

Take Action! The sooner we act, the more plants and wildlife we can save. Tell decision makers to support the Global Warming and Wildlife Survival Act.
>> Find out more.

What You Can Do:

Meet five creatures at risk
Chill the Drills: Keep big oil out of the Polar Bear Seas
Help save wild salmon from global warming
Let your member of Congress know that the Endangered Species Act is needed now more than ever

Global warming has already begun to take a toll on wildlife and plants around the world. Some scientists suggest we could lose as many as one million species worldwide if we don't act quickly. The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change projects that 20-30% of plant and animal species will be at increased risk of extinction even if we dramatically reduce our global warming emissions. Even a fraction of such a loss stands to have severe economic, social and spiritual impacts for all of us.

If we want the world's wildlife and native plants to survive, we must help them adapt by protecting critical habitat and creating corridors that will allow for migration as temperatures rise. If we act now, we can still pass on to our grandchildren a world where polar bears, giant sequoias, wild salmon, sea turtles, rainforests and emperor penguins survive.

According to conservation biologists working in the field, the four key steps to helping wildlife survive are:

Cut global warming emissions by 2 percent a year so that the temperature shift is minimized. Scientists tell us if we can reduce carbon emissions by just 2 percent a year over the next 40 years, we can curb the worst impacts of global warming. If we can keep the temperature increase small, more species will survive and we will have better options for managing them.

Protect adequate and appropriate space. This includes protecting the most important habitat areas, buffer zones between wildlife habitat and development, and corridors to aid wildlife migration.

Limit or eliminate non-climate stresses. Reduce or eliminate habitat fragmentation, over-harvesting, invasive species, disruptive human activities like oil drilling, logging, and pollution.

Where necessary, intervene to help species adapt. In order to help wildlife and plants survive temperature increases, it may be necessary to reintroduce native species, assist in migration, control pests or disease outbreaks, apply prescribed burning, and control invasive species.