Effects of climate change on the distribution of plant species and plant functional strategies on the Canary Islands |
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| Authors: | Dagmar M. Hanz Vanessa Cutts Martha Paola Barajas-Barbosa Adam Algar Carl Beierkuhnlein Flavien Collart José María Fernández-Palacios Richard Field Dirk N. Karger David R. Kienle Holger Kreft Jairo Patiño Franziska Schrodt Manuel J. Steinbauer Patrick Weigelt Severin D. H. Irl |
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| Affiliation: | 1. Biogeography and Biodiversity Lab, Institute of Physical Geography, Goethe-University Frankfurt, Frankfurt am Main, Germany;2. School of Geography, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK;3. German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany;4. Department of Biology, Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada;5. Department of Biogeography, University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany;6. Department of Ecology and Evolution (DEE), Université de Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland;7. Island Ecology and Biogeography Group, Instituto Universitario de Enfermedades Tropicales y Salud Pública de Canarias, Universidad de La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain;8. Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research, Birmensdorf, Switzerland;9. Biodiversity, Macroecology and Conservation Biogeography, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany;10. Island Ecology and Evolution Research Group, Institute of Natural Products and Agrobiology (IPNA-CSIC), La Laguna, Spain;11. BayCEER, Bayreuth Centre of Ecology and Environmental Research, University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany |
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| Abstract: | Aim Oceanic islands possess unique floras with high proportions of endemic species. Island floras are expected to be severely affected by changing climatic conditions as species on islands have limited distribution ranges and small population sizes and face the constraints of insularity to track their climatic niches. We aimed to assess how ongoing climate change affects the range sizes of oceanic island plants, identifying species of particular conservation concern. Location Canary Islands, Spain. Methods We combined species occurrence data from single-island endemic, archipelago endemic and nonendemic native plant species of the Canary Islands with data on current and future climatic conditions. Bayesian Additive Regression Trees were used to assess the effect of climate change on species distributions; 71% (n = 502 species) of the native Canary Island species had models deemed good enough. To further assess how climate change affects plant functional strategies, we collected data on woodiness and succulence. Results Single-island endemic species were projected to lose a greater proportion of their climatically suitable area (x ̃ = −0.36) than archipelago endemics (x ̃ = −0.28) or nonendemic native species (x ̃ = −0.26), especially on Lanzarote and Fuerteventura, which are expected to experience less annual precipitation in the future. Moreover, herbaceous single-island endemics were projected to gain less and lose more climatically suitable area than insular woody single-island endemics. By contrast, we found that succulent single-island endemics and nonendemic natives gain more and lose less climatically suitable area. Main Conclusions While all native species are of conservation importance, we emphasise single-island endemic species not characterised by functional strategies associated with water use efficiency. Our results are particularly critical for other oceanic island floras that are not constituted by such a vast diversity of insular woody species as the Canary Islands. |
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| Keywords: | climate change climatic niche endemism functional strategies oceanic island flora potential habitat range shift |
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