21st century climate change threatens mountain flora unequally across Europe (original) (raw)
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Climate change threats to plant diversity in Europe
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2005
Climate change has already triggered species distribution shifts in many parts of the world. Increasing impacts are expected for the future, yet few studies have aimed for a general understanding of the regional basis for species vulnerability. We projected late 21st century distributions for 1,350 European plants species under seven climate change scenarios. Application of the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources Red List criteria to our projections shows that many European plant species could become severely threatened. More than half of the species we studied could be vulnerable or threatened by 2080. Expected species loss and turnover per pixel proved to be highly variable across scenarios (27-42% and 45-63% respectively, averaged over Europe) and across regions (2.5-86% and 17-86%, averaged over scenarios). Modeled species loss and turnover were found to depend strongly on the degree of change in just two climate variables describing temperature and moisture conditions. Despite the coarse scale of the analysis, species from mountains could be seen to be disproportionably sensitive to climate change (Ϸ60% species loss). The boreal region was projected to lose few species, although gaining many others from immigration. The greatest changes are expected in the transition between the Mediterranean and Euro-Siberian regions. We found that risks of extinction for European plants may be large, even in moderate scenarios of climate change and despite inter-model variability.
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Quantitative estimates of the range loss of mountain plants under climate change have so far mostly relied on static geographical projections of species' habitat shifts 1, 2, 3. Here, we use a hybrid model 4 that combines such projections with simulations of demography and seed dispersal to forecast the climate-driven spatio-temporal dynamics of 150 high-mountain plant species across the European Alps.
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Nature Climate Change 2: 111-115, 2012
Climate impact studies have indicated ecological fingerprints of recent global warming across a wide range of habitats1, 2. Although these studies have shown responses from various local case studies, a coherent large-scale account on temperature-driven changes of biotic communities has been lacking3, 4. Here we use 867 vegetation samples above the treeline from 60 summit sites in all major European mountain systems to show that ongoing climate change gradually transforms mountain plant communities. We provide evidence that the more cold-adapted species decline and the more warm-adapted species increase, a process described here as thermophilization. At the scale of individual mountains this general trend may not be apparent, but at the larger, continental scale we observed a significantly higher abundance of thermophilic species in 2008, compared with 2001. Thermophilization of mountain plant communities mirrors the degree of recent warming and is more pronounced in areas where the temperature increase has been higher. In view of the projected climate change5, 6 the observed transformation suggests a progressive decline of cold mountain habitats and their biota.
Regional Environmental Change
Climate change seriously threatens biodiversity, particularly in mountain ecosystems. However, studies on climate change effects rarely consider endemic species and their niche properties. Using species distribution models, we assessed the impact of climate change on the endemic flora of the richest centre of endemism in the Alps: the South-Western Alps. We projected the potential distributions of 100 taxa under both an optimistic (RCP2.6) and a pessimistic (RCP8.5) climate scenario, analysing the relationships between range dynamics and several predictors (dispersal abilities, vegetation belts, niche marginality, niche breadth, altitudinal range and present range). The negative impact ranged from weak to severe according to the scenario, but the extinction risk was low. The dispersal abilities of species strongly affected these range dynamics. Colline and subalpine species were the most threatened and the relationship between range dynamics and predictors varied among vegetation be...
2018
INDEX pag 1-INTRODUCTION 1.1-Biodiversity in a changing world: the climate threat 1 1.2-Species distribution models and ecological niche analysis 1 1.3-South western Alps as a centre of endemism 2 1.4-References 2 2-CLIMATE CHANGE AND ENDEMISMS: THE FUTURE OF ENDEMIC FLORA OF SW ALPS 2.1-Introduction 6 2.2-Sensitivity of endemic plant species to climate change in South Western Alps 7 3-THE LEGACY OF PAST CLIMATE 3.1-Introduction 47 3.2-Historical and ecological factors affecting species distribution and richness of plant endemic to South Western Alps 48 4-INFRA-SPECIFIC VARIATION OF ECOLOGICAL NICHE 4.1-Introduction 84 4.2-Divergence is not enough: the use of Ecological Niche Models for the validation of taxa boundaries. 86 4.3-Infra-taxon niche structure: implications on the forecasted effects of climate changes. 5-CLIMATE CHANGE AND CONSERVATION OF BIODIVERSITY 5.1-Introduction 5.2-Methods 5.3-Biotic elements 5.4-Areas of endemism 5.5-Effects of climate change 5.6-Conclusion 5.7-References 6-CONCLUSION