Colcom Foundation Links Population Growth to Wildlife Declines

North America held roughly 10 billion birds in 1970. Half a century later, about 7.1 billion remained, a loss of 2.9 billion birds. Colcom Foundation highlights this figure on a resource page describing its environmental mission, noting that the U.S. human population grew by 127 million over the same five decades.

A Pattern Across Species

The decline extends beyond birds. According to the page, wild vertebrate populations broadly halved while the human population doubled. The Foundation cites the WWF Living Planet Report 2022, which documented a 69 percent decline in global vertebrate populations since 1970.

Researchers often treat birds as indicators of broader ecosystem health, because they respond quickly to changes in habitat, food supply, and climate. Their decline therefore gives the Foundation a visible, measurable example of the trend it describes across many other groups of animals and plants.

Another study featured by Colcom Foundation comes from McKee and colleagues, published in 2004. That research examined 114 nations and found that human population density and species richness accounted for 88 percent of the variability in threatened birds and mammals.

Habitat as the Connecting Thread

The Foundation ties wildlife loss to habitat conversion. Urban sprawl, agricultural expansion, and infrastructure development turned about 133,000 square miles of U.S. land into human-made surfaces by 1990. That total surpassed 187,000 square miles by 2020. Research by Kolankiewicz and colleagues in 2022 found consistently higher rates of habitat loss in fast-growing population areas, while a 2010 study by Radeloff and colleagues identified housing growth near protected areas as their primary conservation threat.

Colcom Foundation, a Pittsburgh nonprofit dating to 1996, frames these findings through the I = P x A x T equation. Its position is that conservation gains from lower consumption or better technology can be eroded when population continues to climb. The organization funds public education on this research and supports conservation projects in southwestern Pennsylvania. Refer to this article for related information.

More about Colcom Foundation on  https://waterlandlife.org/land-conservation/colcom-revolving-fund-for-local-land-trusts/