With more than 80 percent of California in extreme drought, things are tough out there for birds (and for farmers and people, too). Already we’ve seen studies linking drought to reduced breeding of waterfowl and raptors. The big question that I frequently get asked is: Is this climate change?

Scientists are actually divided over whether the California drought is a product of climate change. Some researchers point out that because the Golden State has been unusually wet during our lifetimes, we may not understand that drought has been a regular occurrence historically. Studies of tree rings in ancient trees has revealed that California has been experiencing extended droughts – some as long at 10 or 20 years – for thousands of years. A recent study out of Utah State University, however, links the drought directly to climate change. Man-made global greenhouse gases, the study asserts, can act as a trigger for drought in California and extreme winters in the East.

But whether climate change is causing the drought isn’t really the right the question. A better question is whether we’re learning the lessons that the drought is teaching us. Climate change is coming, and it looks a lot like the drought. A simple way to think about it is that the most extreme weather events (such as drought in the West and heavy winters in the East) will become the norm. The so-called 100-year flood becomes the 10-year flood, for instance. According to a report issued last year by the California Environmental Protection Agency, climate change is already decreasing spring snowmelt runoff, raising sea levels along the California coast, shrinking glaciers, increasing wildfires, warming lakes and ocean waters, and the causing the gradual migration of many plants and animals to higher elevations.

None of this is to say that we shouldn’t take steps to address the drought. Of course we should – there are all sorts of actions we can take to safeguard birds, communities and agriculture. But we also need to tackle the challenge of climate change with the same, if not greater, determination.

Brigid McCormack is executive director of Audubon California.

(photo by Christopher Hynes)