| 1. |
- Mason, Lucy R., et al.
(författare)
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Population responses of bird populations to climate change on two continents vary with species’ ecological traits but not with direction of change in climate suitability
- 2019
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Ingår i: Climatic Change. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0165-0009 .- 1573-1480. ; 157:3-4, s. 337-354
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Climate change is a major global threat to biodiversity with widespread impacts on ecological communities. Evidence for beneficial impacts on populations is perceived to be stronger and more plentiful than that for negative impacts, but few studies have investigated this apparent disparity, or how ecological factors affect population responses to climatic change. We examined the strength of the relationship between species-specific regional population changes and climate suitability trends (CST), using 30-year datasets of population change for 525 breeding bird species in Europe and the USA. These data indicate a consistent positive relationship between population trend and CST across the two continents. Importantly, we found no evidence that this positive relationship differs between species expected to be negatively and positively impacted across the entire taxonomic group, suggesting that climate change is causing equally strong, quantifiable population increases and declines. Species’ responses to changing climatic suitability varied with ecological traits, however, particularly breeding habitat preference and body mass. Species associated with inland wetlands responded most strongly and consistently to recent climatic change. In Europe, smaller species also appeared to respond more strongly, whilst the relationship with body mass was less clear-cut for North American birds. Overall, our results identify the role of certain traits in modulating responses to climate change and emphasise the importance of long-term data on abundance for detecting large-scale species’ responses to environmental changes.
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| 2. |
- O'Reilly, Enya, et al.
(författare)
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An assessment of relative habitat use as a metric for species’ habitat association and degree of specialization
- 2022
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Ingår i: Ecological Indicators. - : Elsevier BV. - 1470-160X. ; 135
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In order to understand species’ sensitivity to habitat change, we must correctly determine if a species is associated with a habitat or not, and if it is associated, its degree of specialization for that habitat. However, definitions of species’ habitat association and specialization are often static, categorical classifications that coarsely define species as either habitat specialists or generalists and can fail to account for potential temporal or spatial differences in association or specialization. In contrast, quantitative metrics can provide a more nuanced assessment, defining species’ habitat associations and specialization along a continuous scale and accommodate for temporal or spatial variation, but these approaches are less widely used. Here we explore relative habitat use (RHU) as a metric for quantifying species’ association with and degree of specialization for different habitat types. RHU determines the extent of a species’ association with a given habitat by comparing its abundance in that habitat relative to its mean abundance across all other habitats. Using monitoring data for breeding birds across Europe from 1998 to 2017; we calculate RHU scores for 246 species for five habitat types and compared them to the literature-based classifications of their association with and specialization for each of these habitats. We also explored the temporal variation in species’ RHU scores for each habitat and assessed how this varied according to association and degree of specialization. In general, species’ RHU and literature-derived classifications were well aligned, as RHU scores for a given habitat increased in line with reported association and specialization. In addition, temporal variation in RHU scores were influenced by association and degree of specialization, with lower scores for those associated with, and those more specialized to, a given habitat. As a continuous metric, RHU allows a detailed assessment of species’ association with and degree of specialization for different habitats that can be tailored to specific temporal and/or spatial requirements. It has the potential to be a valuable tool for identifying indicator species and in supporting the design, implementation and monitoring of conservation management actions.
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| 3. |
- Tayleur, Catherine, et al.
(författare)
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Swedish birds are tracking temperature but not rainfall: evidence from a decade of abundance changes
- 2015
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Ingår i: Global Ecology and Biogeography. - : Wiley. - 1466-8238 .- 1466-822X. ; 24:7, s. 859-872
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Aim: To quantify avian distribution shifts and the extent of niche tracking in response to changing temperature and precipitation patterns. Location: Sweden. Methods: We used abundance monitoring data to quantify changes in bird species distributions between two time periods, 2000-02 and 2010-12. First we examined shifts at the level of whole distributions using population centroids in temperature, rainfall, altitude, latitude and longitude. We then characterized shifts in temperature and latitude at different parts of species ranges using species response curves (SRC). We accounted for yearly turnover in abundance and sampling effort, and compared the observed shifts with those expected under perfect niche tracking. Results: Most species demonstrated changes in their distributions over the last decade but not all were in response to weather. The degree to which species tracked their climatic niches and the dynamics driving these shifts varied considerably. Only 20% of species shifted in the direction expected given the temperature changes, while few showed a strong response to rainfall. Most shifts did not fully compensate for changes in temperature. Range changes were most evident at the leading edges, but there was some evidence for retractions of trailing edges. Amongst species that tracked temperature, those with southerly distributions were less successful at tracking changes than those in the north. Main conclusions: Swedish birds demonstrated highly dynamic distributions, with many rapid directional shifts occurring over the last decade. However, only a few species kept pace with observed climatic change. Species that did not track their climatic niche may be tolerant to ongoing climatic change or constrained by strong habitat requirements. We demonstrate that measuring range shifts along both environmental and geographic gradients can help disentangle drivers of distribution changes.
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