Studying puffin populations on three Norwegian islands, scientists have uncovered the first evidence to connect a large-scale hybridization to 20th-century warming trends. Yet a serious decline in the birds’’ genetic diversity does not bode well for their future.
A recent study found that populations of tufted puffin, one of Washington’s most charismatic but endangered seabirds, are declining across 75 percent of their range in North America.