Conservation and Biodiversity
Adapt or Die: 6 Weird Ways Animals are Adapting to Climate Change
July 22, 2025
As heat waves hit the animal kingdom, nature is rewriting its playbook. Across ecosystems, animals are finding ways to survive, even in the face of an increasingly hostile climate.
While in an ideal world, these adaptations would never be needed, but their ability to adapt shows us how robust and naturally regenerative species on our planet can be. If anything, the adaptation of life around us is a reminder that our campaign for the environment is worthwhile. Nature is pulling its weight; the question is – will we?
A Wardrobe for Warmer Weather
The European tawny owl is changing as a species – literally. As winters grow milder and snow becomes increasingly scarce, these birds are ‘swapping’ their gray plumage for a warmer brown. This isn’t a matter of following the latest fowl fashion trend – this is evolution in action.
Traditionally, tawny owls range from pale gray to dark brown, with gray morphs (i.e. owls with predominantly gray feathers) thriving in snowy, cold environments and brown morphs more common in warmer, humid regions.
However, as climate change leads to less snow, brown owls are surviving and reproducing at higher rates in areas that were once dominated by gray morphs. This shift is not just a matter of individual owls changing color, but rather a change in the genetic makeup of the population over generations. Researchers have tied this shift in color pigmentation to genes responsible for other survival traits designed to help them thrive in extreme environments, such as those related to maintaining energy homeostasis, fat deposition, and control over starvation responses.
In essence, the genes that make an owl gray also give it biological tools to cope with extreme cold and lack of food. As our winters become milder, these survival traits—and the gray color associated with them—become less necessary, so brown-colored owls (who lack these cold-adapted genes) are becoming more common.
Shrinking to Survive
Clownfish are adapting too, but in a very different way: they’re just shrinking! According to a recent study, clownfish are decreasing in size by an estimated 1-2% during marine heatwaves. Although this may seem alarming, in reality, it’s a clever method of adaptation.
Reducing their size helps clownfish match their energy needs to the environment around them. Smaller bodies require less energy and oxygen, which is especially important when warmer water holds less oxygen and food becomes scarce. In fact, shrinking just once has been shown to improve their survival probability by a staggering 78% in the face of heat waves.
Going Deeper
In the rocky slopes of the Western United States, the American pika – a small, rabbit-like species – is adapting in essential ways. Making use of crevices to stay cool, American pikas have always spent a whole lot of time underground. But researchers have found that these little lagomorphs are now working on a new schedule, only peeking out of their burrows during dawn, dusk, or night, when temperatures are moderate.
In addition to their new timetables, pikas are also adopting new homes, nestling down deeper than ever before, where subsurface temperatures can be nearly 10 degrees Celsius cooler during the hottest times of the day.
Doing all they can to avoid the heat, pikas are also changing their diets. Pikas used to spend hours foraging for grasses, sedges, herbaceous flowering plants, thistles, fireweed, and other wildflowers. Now they are relying much more on eating moss that is easily accessible all year-round, and limits the hours they need to spend foraging for their former favorites, which means less time on the surface.
Reptiles Rewriting the Rules
Reptiles around the world are adapting too, this time in how they nurture their offspring. Researchers have discovered that the eastern three-lined skink, for example, has begun nesting four weeks earlier, over the short course of a decade.
Higher temperatures accelerate the development of reptile embryos, often resulting in offspring that are smaller and less developed at hatching.
Other reptiles, including the Chinese alligator and American crocodile, have made similar nesting changes to avoid the stresses of high nesting temperatures.
Reptiles are also choosing cooler locations for their nesting sites. Kemp’s ridley sea turtle has done just this, moving farther north to find nesting sites. Other reptiles, like American crocodiles in Florida, have begun to diversify their nest types to mitigate the risk of an entire litter failing to hatch, laying some eggs in coastal sand mounds and some in hole nests or creek banks.
When Poop Becomes a Solution
Animals are changing more than just their own behavior; they’re reforming ecosystems too.
In the Andes, the vicuña – a relative of the llama – is unknowingly bringing ecosystems back to life.
As glaciers continue to melt, they leave behind land that is nutrient-deprived. A recent study shows that vicuña poop (yes, poop) plays a pivotal role in promoting plant growth in these barren landscapes. When vicuñas leave behind a meal already enjoyed, they transport nutrients from established ecosystems to the newly exposed soil, accelerating the process of plant growth by over 100 years.
Timing the Ticking Clock
African wild dogs are adjusting the timing of one of the most critical parts of their life cycle – birth. Over the past thirty years, these dogs have shifted their average birthing date back by three weeks to avoid rearing their pups during the hot season when survival is less likely. This shift comes as cool seasons are becoming shorter and shorter over time, and the temperature indicators signaling ideal birthing conditions are occurring later in the year.
This change initially seems successfully adaptive. However, as cool seasons grow shorter and fall later in the year, the climate cues that wild dogs have always relied on are now failing them. Pups are still ending up being born in the dangerous heat because the parents can no longer predict when to rear them, a blunt reminder of adaptation’s limitations.
The Edge of Adaptation
Across continents, kingdoms, and species, animals are finding ways to survive in a changing world. But as these examples have shown, adaptation alone cannot solve the issues presented by climate change; the task of survival cannot become the sole responsibility of the animal kingdom.
The real question of adaptation lies with us humans: can we make the changes to support life around us?
If you would like to learn more about EARTHDAY.ORG’s mission, check out our climate action articles. Or if you’re in the mood for something a bit more lighthearted, find out what endangered species you’re most similar to here!
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