Research overview: climate change effects on lynx-hare cycles

An overview of how a warming climate may disrupt the snowshoe hare cycle and the lynx that depend on it. Changes in snow cover threaten the seasonal camouflage of hares, potentially increasing their predation and altering cycle amplitude, while shifting boreal vegetation, weather and the predator community could dampen or desynchronize the classic ten-year oscillation. This survey synthesizes evidence and hypotheses on climate-driven changes in hare coat-color mismatch, cycle dynamics, and the northward contraction of suitable lynx range, with implications for one of ecology's most iconic predator-prey systems. It connects climate change to the mechanisms generating the cycle and to lynx conservation. The topic addresses how global change may reshape a long-stable felid predator-prey relationship at the heart of boreal ecology.