Impacts of Global Warming on the Snow Leopard

Xiaotong Feng

1,*,† a

, Jiaxuan Li

2,*,† b

, Hanwei Liu

3,*,† c

and Jiahui Zhang

4,*,† d

The University of California, Davis, 95616 Davis CA California, U.S.A.

Shanghai Shangde Experimental School, 200001 Shanghai, China

Shanghai New Channel School, 200001 Shanghai, China

Jiangxi University of Technology High School, 330000 Jiangxi, China

Corresponding author

†

These authors contributed equally

Keywords: Global Warming, Snow Leopard, Glacial Melting, Reeline Shift Effects.

Abstract: The distribution of the snow leopard is around 12 countries where the elevation is between 3, 000-4, 500

meters with arid and semi-arid shrubland, grasslands, or steppes. As a top predator, the snow leopard plays

an important role in controlling the prey population and promoting biodiversity. However, global warming

caused by human activities is destroying the living environment of the snow leopard. In order to protect snow

leopards effectively, this study investigates the impacts of global warming on the living situation of the snow

leopard from four aspects. Primarily, glacial melting is discussed, where the retreating speed of many glaciers

in snow leopard's habitat and their prey is reduced. Subsequently, treeline shift effects are analysed, where

climate change results in treeline shift, and the forest ascending into alpine shrub and grassland which are

snow leopard's preferred habitats. In addition, extreme weather events are also evaluated, where global

warming brings the high frequency of extreme weather, decreasing the survival rate of the main prey of the

snow leopard. Eventually, the impacts of wetlands are demonstrated, where destruction of wetlands due to

global warming threatens the livestock the main prey and increases the competition between humans and

snow leopards. These results show the urgency of protecting the snow leopard.

1 INTRODUCTION

Global warming is the long-term increase of

temperature over the world since the pre-industrial

period caused by human activities such as the overuse

of fossil fuels. Over the last century, Global warming

has led to ocean acidification, treeline shift, sea-level

rise, and other environmental problems (Aryal,

2016). According to the observations, creatures are

very sensitive to climate. When climate change,

species will go extinct or colonize new habitats where

the climate becomes newly suitable (CNCCC, 2007).

For terrestrial biota, global warming will change soil

chemistry, e.g., leaching and erosion rate. In addition,

global warming results in species shifting at different

rate, i.e., communities often dissociate into their

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component species. Additionally, unusual

assemblages of plants and animals would form since

species responded differently to climate change

(CNCCC, 2007).

As a typical species living in marginal habitats,

the snow leopards are deeply shrunk by climate

change. The snow leopard is distributed in 12

countries from the southern Himalayas, across the

Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, and the mountain in central

Asia. Most of the habitats of the snow leopard are arid

and semi-arid shrubland, grasslands, or steppes. They

live in places with the elevation between 3,000 and

4,500 meters, even up to 5,500 meters in the

Himalayas region (Conservation of Migratory

species of Wild Animals, 2020). Even though the

range of snow leopards is around 12 countries, it is

still under low density ranging between 4, 500-6000

Feng, X., Li, J., Liu, H. and Zhang, J.

Impacts of Global Warming on the Snow Leopard.

DOI: 10.5220/0011198000003443

In Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Biomedical Engineering and Bioinformatics (ICBEB 2022), pages 249-253

ISBN: 978-989-758-595-1

249

individuals (Dubey, 2003). The snow leopard has an

important role in controlling the prey populations and

promoting biodiversity in ecological function.

Besides, it is essential for the protection area to gather

financial support (Dyurgerov, 2005). However, due

to the reduction of habitat and food, the number of

snow leopards continued to decrease significantly.

The main habitat of the snow leopard is the

Himalayan region, which is one of the most climate-

sensitive areas in the world. For example, the

temperature in the Himalayan region increased three

times than the general area from 1975-2005

(Farrington, Li, 2016). Owing to increasing

temperature, tree line shifts up, glacial melts and

extreme weather events appear which threatens the

living conditions of the snow leopard. According to

anticipation models, 10-30% of snow leopard habitat

in the Himalayas region will lose until 2050

(Dyurgerov, 2005). Besides, according to the dearth

of even anecdotal report in 2006, the conflict between

the snow leopard and human was common and a

growing problem due to living habitats loss

(Farrington, Tsering, 2019). Therefore, the

International Union for Conservation of Nature

(IUCN) set the snow leopard as “Vulnerable”

(Dubey, 2003).

There were only a few passages that focus on the

impact of global warming on the snow leopard. In

order to bring the public’s attention to the current

difficulty and threats faced by the snow leopard, this

study will analyze the living situation of the snow

leopard from four perspectives: 1) tree line shift, 2)

glacial melting, 3) reduction in prey and increasing

conflict with human and 4) extreme weather.

2 IMPACTS ON SNOW

LEOPARDS

Global warming has resulted in a wide range of

changes in the globe, some of which have important

implications for distribution and survival of snow

leopards. This study specifically investigates four

changes: glacial melting, tree line shift, wetlands

decreasing, and more frequent extreme weather

events; and the corresponding impacts on snow

leopards.

2.1 Glacial Melting

With the rising temperature under climate change,

many glaciers in the snow leopard’s range have been

retreated. The IPCC AR5 report states that over the

last 10 years, the Asian mountains have been one of

the earth’s five regions that have lost their glacial ice

most (Fernandez-Gimenez, 2012), due in part to

constant and continuous warming process in these

regions. Over last 100 years, the warming extent in

Himalayas has been a great deal greater than global

average of 0.74℃ (Forrest, 2012). Furthermore, the

Tibetan Plateau, a primary region in the snow

leopard’s range, is one of the most sensitive areas

responding to climate change as the warming trend is

more pronounced with an increase in elevation

(Grace, 2002). Its increase in temperature was

approximately 0.16℃ from 1955 to1996, exceeding

the average increase in the northern hemisphere

(Harman, 2002).

As a result, the retreating speed of many glaciers

in snow leopard’s habitat are higher than other

regions (IPCC, 2007). As shown in Fig.1, the line

representing Himalaya falls most steeply among

other lines, which indicates that the retreat of

Himalaya glaciers is relatively rapid in comparison to

other mountain regions. Moreover, on the Tibetan

Plateau, the glacial area has reduced by 4.5% over the

last two decades (IPCC, 2013). Hence, time-released

water needed by snow leopards and their prey is

reduced, affecting the population of snow leopards.

Moreover, in the eastern and central Himalayas,

glacial melt associated with climate change has led to

the formation of glacial lakes in open areas behind

exposed end moraines. Plenty of these high-elevation

lakes are dangerous, and may result in glacial lake

outburst flood (GLOF) hazards, bringing catastrophic

consequences downstream (Harman, 2002). This

may potentially kill numerous livestock and even

blue sheep (Kazmi, 2021). The consequent decline of

prey may indirectly affect the snow leopards.

Figure 1: Rapid retreat of greater Himalayan glaciers

compared with the global average (IPCC, 2007).

ICBEB 2022 - The International Conference on Biomedical Engineering and Bioinformatics

250

2.2

Tree Line Shift

The tree line is the edge of the habitat at which trees

are capable of growing. Tree line shift is usually a

result of human activities, e.g., grazing and

woodcutting. Nevertheless, previous studies have

proved that the transition of tree line has a strong

correlation with rising temperature (Körner, 2004);

(Liu, Chen, 2000), indicating that upward tree line

movement may also be a response of climate change.

In addition, Himalayan region is one of the most

pristine environments on earth. Therefore, it is least

affected by anthropogenic activities (Lovari, 2013),

which means that tree line shift is more likely to be a

response of warming.

Climate change results in tree line shift, directly

affecting snow leopard’s habitats. The upward shift

of tree lines means the forest ascending into alpine

shrub and grassland, which are snow leopard’s

preferred habitats. Fig. 2 shows that snow leopard

habitat is vulnerable to the climate-induced tree line

shift. It indicates that snow leopards may lose a

considerable number of habitats, and their

distribution may be affected greatly. It is observed

that in Himachal Pradesh in the Western Himalaya,

tree line is presently increasing in elevation at a rate

of 14–19 m/decade (Lovari, 2013). Owing to such

rapid upslope shift of tree lines and resultant

shrinkage of alpine zone, the snow leopard habitat in

higher Himalayas may be reduced by around 30%.

Snow leopard habitat may also shift northward, since

the habitat loss mainly occur along the southern edge

of the Himalayas, forcing snow leopards to migrate to

the north (Mahmood, 2019).

Figure 2: Vulnerability of snow leopard habitat in the Himalaya to treeline shift (Mahmood, 2019).

The upward movement of tree line will also lead

to the upslope shifting of various species that living

depend on or below the forest line. On this basis, it

can translate to the interspecific competition which is

a competition between organisms between two

different species. Common leopard, which is one of

the biggest threats for snow leopard, are chosen to be

a widely acceptable object for numerous researches.

It is one of the top predators in the world, which has

a preference for inhabiting in woodland while snow

leopard tends to live and hunt in cold and rocky area

which is almost above the tree line. As common

leopard can live up to 5200m whereas along the

Himalayan range down to 3000m is for snow leopard,

there has been an overlap in about 2200m between

the two species along the Himalayan range. This

Impacts of Global Warming on the Snow Leopard

251

overlap will worsen the situation of snow leopard in

aspects of loss of territories, interspecific killing and

competition in prey (Peters, 1990).

Since the habitats are occupied by common

leopard, which is larger, heavier and more adaptable

to environment change than those of snow leopard,

the habitats and population size of snow leopard will

be threatened badly. Besides, due to the diet overlap,

the niche breadth and spectrum of prey species of the

snow leopard are smaller than those of the common

leopard. All of those competitive factors will lead

snow leopard’s population to shrink or even to extinct

(Farrington, Li, 2016); (Peters, 1990).

2.3 Extreme Weather Events

It is reported that extreme weather events happened

in higher frequency and intensity because of climate

change. In Mongolia, severe winter snow disasters,

known as “dzud” are increasing in frequency (Shen,

2020). During dzud, deep snows often made livestock

unable to forage on grass, result in starvation and high

mortality rates of livestock. There were six dzud

events occurred in Mongolia during 1991 - 2010, a

number higher than the sum of events happened over

last 50 years, while the 2009-2010 dzud killed 20%

of Mongolia’s livestock (Shen, 2020). In addition, the

frequency of spring droughts and unseasonal spring

and summer snowfalls is higher. These events either

delay or reduce the growth of grass at the time when

nutritious grass shoots are most needed by livestock

that has recently given birth (Kazmi, 2021). Hence,

less livestock is available, leading to lower prey

availability, which can have severe impact to snow

leopards. Since snow leopard is a key stone species

which has function of controlling organisms’

population in high altitude area, the fluctuations of

prey number will bring significant influences

indirectly due to the potential impact on food chain.

Among all the affected prey species, blue sheep

can be one of the most common and representative

prey for snow leopard all over the world. Study shows

distributions and number of blue sheep have

decreased in past several years and will possibly

continue declining in the future which can translate to

the decrease of number of snow leopard. Climate

change leads to a low degree of overlap between blue

sheep and snow leopard. In addition, the reduction of

the main prey may lead snow leopard to broaden its

diet breadth with common leopard as well as other

carnivores such as Tibetan wolf, and the competitions

are adverse for snow leopards. Furthermore, the

decrease of wild prey can force snow leopard to

search for other kind of food sources such as livestock

of human, this can lead to a retaliation between

human and snow leopards. Therefore, the population

size of snow leopard will reduce (Farrington, Li,

2016); (Wang, 2006).

2.4 Wetlands

Wetland is a major ecosystem in the snow leopard’s

range, but it is also vulnerable to the climate change

due to slow adaptation to changing environments,

especially for alpine wetlands where warming is more

pronounced. On account of permafrost degradation

caused by climate change, the area of alpine wetlands

on the Tibetan Plateau has declined by 37% over

recent decades (Xu, 2007). Moreover, the level of

saline lakes increased at a rapid rate, inundating much

pastureland. As a result, many herding communities

reduced in size and had to move upslope, leading to

more competition between livestock and blue sheep.

As less food is available for livestock, its number

declined. This also contributed to more severe snow

leopard-human conflict (Kazmi, 2021).

3 CONCLUSION

In summary, this paper aims to investigate the effects

of climate change on the distribution of snow

leopards. The basic background about snow leopards

is that they mainly live in the region of the Himalayas

which is nearer to China. In this paper, the hypothesis

is the population of snow leopards will decrease due

to the global warming caused by climate change.

Based on our analysis, the shrink and upload of tree

line shifting will cause a decrease in the size of their

habitats which may trigger the decrease in

population. Glacial melting will cause a decrease in

water resources and flooding, which is the reason that

may intrigue the decreasing of snow leopards’

population. These effects can directly contribute to

the shrinking areas of snow leopards’ population,

limiting their distribution. Additionally, the decrease

in wetland and raising the saline lake enable the

edible water resources to disappear, i.e., the

population of preys (Himalayan tahr, blue sheep,

Siberian ibex) and snow leopards will be decreased,

which has the same function as such extreme weather

such as snow disasters and big storms. These events

will result in the interspecific competition and

reduction in prey. The effects of interspecific

competition are expressed by the distribution upload

shifting, for the snow leopards will avoid the conflict

to protect themselves or confront the conflict to gain

food. The reduction of prey, naturally caused by some

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geographic impacts mentioned before, will be

influenced by human activities. The food chains’

balance is broken. All of these reasons are led by

climate change and will result in decreasing of snow

leopards’ population and affecting the distribution of

snow leopards. This result responses to the

hypothesis and research question.

Species are already being impacted by

anthropogenic climate change, and its rapid onset is

limiting the ability of many species to adapt to their

environments. Climate change is currently affecting

19% of species listed as threatened on the IUCN Red

List of Threatened Species, increasing the likelihood

of their extinction including the snow leopards.

Therefore, reducing the impact of climate change and

protect the species is an important work for the

human.

Establishing the protected area is a method that

can contribute to the protection directly. Scientists

have already built some protected areas to protect the

population of snow leopards. One of the main

advantages of having nature reserves is that they

protect biodiversity and endangered species such as

snow leopards. Because enough biodiversity is

needed to maintain the natural balance of the

ecosystem. The species can get rid of the human

impact mainly. Nevertheless, the drawback is that for

some endangered species, Protected areas do nothing

to help snow leopards get rid of climate change

naturally. Thus, any of the causes that were talked

about before are potentially harmful to the snow

leopards. A human can try more ways that can reduce

the impacts of climate change on geographic and

biological impacts. These results offer a guideline for

the importance and urgency of snow leopards’

protection

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