Range Shifts

Range shift is a large concern for the Pika because of the threat of extinction due to climate warming as the Pika population is pushed ever higher to remain in their temperate zone.

It has been noted that Pikas will modify their behavior by moving upslope to cooler temperature (Hafner 1991).

The compounding problem to the Pika’s precarious position is that they have very specific habitat requirements. They will only live in cool moist microclimates in talus or sub talus environments. Given that  the variability of microclimates and how they might be impacted by climate change (Early and Sax 2011) even if the mountainside has places where the Pika could live temperature-wise, the location needs to be talus or talus like and needs to have a water source.  If these three factors do not move at the same speed or have a mis-match then this can create barriers to suitable habitats and movement into a climate that matches two out these three factors.