People aren’t the only ones hot and bothered by this crazy El Nino weather. Fact is, some of Hawaii’s critters are just a little bit off kilter right now, while others face a possible life-or-death struggle.

Corals are dying, schools of deepwater fish are on the move, looking for food, and forest birds are expected to be challenged for survival.

This year’s strong El Nino has brought heat and humidity, weaker tradewinds, warmer ocean water, lots of summer rain and the threat of hurricanes.

If the El Nino weather pattern holds true to form in the coming months — and there’s no reason to believe it won’t, given the classic characteristics already shown during summer — look for unseasonably warm days ahead as the rainy weather turns to drought throughout winter and into the spring.

Scientists say the El Nino anomalies upset the balance of nature in the islands, changing behaviors and habitats along with the weather, and offering a sneak preview of the environmental pressures and extremes expected in a future world of global warming.

At the same time, they say, Hawaii’s creatures are a resilient bunch. After all, El Nino is not new. The intermittent climate phenomenon — in which warm ocean water pools at the equator and ends up changing weather patterns across the globe — has only come into better focus in recent decades with the help of satellite technology.

Unknown is whether climate change is playing a role in the El Nino phenomenon, scientists say. Is this year’s strong El Nino exacerbated by climate change? Will El Nino become more frequent and more intense in decades to come?

Whatever the case, this year’s peculiar weather appears to be linked with some odd behavior in the islands. There have been reports of abnormal swarms of bees, as well as birds hanging out in places where they’re usually not seen.

In Hawaii no creatures are taking a bigger hit this year than the corals. Ocean waters only a degree or two higher than normal are causing widespread coral mortality in Hawaii’s waters, officials said.

In a process not entirely understood, the warmer water causes the tissue of the coral to eject its symbiotic algae, leaving the corals to starve and fade to white without their primary source of food.

Last month, state aquatic officials reported that up to 50 percent of the corals in Kaneohe Bay are experiencing some degree of bleaching, and additional reports were coming in from across the state.

Runoff from more frequent storms this summer could also worsen the health of corals, they said.

Elsewhere in Hawaii’s marine environment, warmer waters are driving tuna and other deepwater fish to cooler waters in the east, according to Eileen Shea, a consultant and former Pacific islands regional coordinator with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The result, she said, is that fishermen are traveling farther east in search of fish, which drives up the price of ahi.

On land, meanwhile, it could be a challenging year for the creatures that live in and around Hawaii’s streams, said Rich MacKenzie, an aquatic ecologist with the U.S. Forest Service on the Big Island.

With more intense storms, swollen streams might experience more scouring from boulders, which reduces stream-bottom algae and aquatic plants that stream life depends on for food, MacKenzie said.

Conversely, as the rain stops and stream flows begin to dwindle, there will be less aquatic habitat and fewer opportunities for freshwater species to reproduce and grow, he said.

While Hawaii species are dynamic and adapted to survive such extremes, many creatures could face a struggle to survive if they are hammered by a double whammy of storms followed by drought, MacKenzie said.

“It could be a rough year,” he said.

For now the plentiful summer rain has turned the Hawaii landscape into a tropical paradise of lush vegetation.

Jeff Burgett, science coordinator with the Pacific Island Climate Change Cooperative, said that while pigs, deer and sheep are loving the abundant grass, there will likely be a point when the rain ceases and the grass begins to dry up and turn brown.

“There will be a huge fuel buildup that supports intense fires,” Burgett said.

Native plants are not adapted for fire survival, he said, and many wildlife species may be threatened by fires as well.

Drought is historically the most significant feature of El Nino in Hawaii. In fact, the most severe drought events of the past 15 years are associated with the El Nino phenomenon, officials said.

If drought in the coming months is as severe as forecasters expect, it could be bad news for many of Hawaii’s birds and animals.

In one of the only studies that looked at El Nino’s impact on wildlife, forest birds were found to have been reduced in number, had lower fat content and fewer active nests due to the drought during the 1991-92 El Nino.

The U.S. Geological Service study was conducted on the southwestern slope of Mauna Kea on the Big Island and examined six resident birds — Hawaii amakihi, palila, elepaio, Japanese white-eye, red-billed leiothrix and house finch — most of which suffered.

Paul Banko, a USGS wildlife biologist, said drought is especially hard on the rare palila because it reduces the size of the mamane seed crop, which is the endangered bird’s only source of food.

While El Nino is generally a bad thing for Hawaii’s animals, there’s at least one critter that excels.

Hawaiian monk seals thrive as their pups are larger, find more food and have better survival rates, said Charles Littnan, lead scientist with NOAA’s Hawaiian Monk Seal Program.

Biologists have looked at the phenomenon for some time but have not been able to figure out exactly why this is, he said.

Littnan said that either schooling prey are more accessible to the seals, or somehow conditions end up displacing competitors for food, or the conditions allow the seals’ prey of fish, octopus and crustaceans to be more abundant.

“Maybe it’s a combination of those things,” he said.