Extrapolating demography with climate,proximity and phylogeny: approach with caution |
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| Authors: | Shaun R. Coutts Roberto Salguero‐Gómez Anna M. Csergő Yvonne M. Buckley |
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| Affiliation: | 1. School of Biological Sciences, Centre for Biodiversity and Conservation Science, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Qld., Australia;2. Department of Animal and Plant Sciences, University of Sheffield, Western Bank, Sheffield, UK;3. School of Natural Sciences, Zoology, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin 2, Ireland;4. Evolutionary Demography Laboratory, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, DE‐18057, Germany |
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| Abstract: | Plant population responses are key to understanding the effects of threats such as climate change and invasions. However, we lack demographic data for most species, and the data we have are often geographically aggregated. We determined to what extent existing data can be extrapolated to predict population performance across larger sets of species and spatial areas. We used 550 matrix models, across 210 species, sourced from the COMPADRE Plant Matrix Database, to model how climate, geographic proximity and phylogeny predicted population performance. Models including only geographic proximity and phylogeny explained 5–40% of the variation in four key metrics of population performance. However, there was poor extrapolation between species and extrapolation was limited to geographic scales smaller than those at which landscape scale threats typically occur. Thus, demographic information should only be extrapolated with caution. Capturing demography at scales relevant to landscape level threats will require more geographically extensive sampling. |
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| Keywords: | COMPADRE Plant Matrix Database comparative demography damping ratio elasticity matrix population model phylogenetic analysis population growth rate (λ ) spatially lagged models |
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