Originally published on BarryNerhus.com

Given the magnitude of today’s environmental issues, there are an array of subjects that fall under the scope of “at risk.” Few things are more of an indicator of a depleting environment than the decline of a species. With how much of an emphasis we place on the extinction of a species, we tend to ignore declines in others despite how large of an impact this has on the surrounding ecosystem.

A loss of abundance of certain species affects nearly every living organism in its habitat. The services they provide to their local environment contribute to the bigger picture of “ecological, evolutionary, economic, and social aspects.” Measuring this enormous impact requires long-term studying of a species’ population size, its trends, and very specific data that can be challenging to obtain.

With all of that said, birds are perhaps the biggest indicator of our environment’s…