Researchers at Western University say the ecological effects of the extremely cold winter may be felt well into the summer.
Brent Sinclair, an associate professor at Western's Faculty of Science, has been reviewing how the winter conditions will affect living things - from hibernating mammals and overwintering insects to migrating birds and plants and soil microbes.
In a statement, Sinclair said it's still too early to tell how things will change, but they definitely will change.
"People want to know if this weird winter will kill mosquitoes or the emerald ash borer, but winter is a complicated season...For plants and animals in the wild, winter conditions are a combination of the average temperature, the extreme fluctuations in temperature and snow cover so there are many variables."
He added that while some birds will have burned more energy during a long, cold winter, and some insects will have been killed, other bugs will actually have saved energy and have higher survival rates.
Most animals will survive a harsh winter but growth and reproduction in the summer could be affected.
As for insects like mosquitoes and emerald ash borers, most are extremely well-adapted to low temperatures and insects native to Canada most likely survived the cold winter, Sinclair said.
"Many of the headline numbers we've seen have been wind chill values, which cold-blooded insects don't experience, rather than absolute numbers...However, some species that traditionally have northern distribution at the Canada-U.S. border may have been knocked back."
Sinclair teamed with Hugh Henry from Western's Department of Biology and Western alumna and current University of Florida researcher Caroline Williams on the research, which was published by Biological Reviews.
