Predicting suitable habitat of an invasive weed Parthenium hysterophorus under future climate scenarios in Chitwan Annapurna Landscape, Nepal

Abstract Ceroplastes cirripediformis Comstock is one of the most destructive invasive pests that have caused various negative impacts to agricultural, ornamental, and greenhouse plants. Since it is time- and labor-consuming to control C. cirripediformis, habitat evaluation of this pest may be the most cost-effective method for predicting its dispersal and avoiding its outbreaks. Here, we evaluated the effects of climatic variables on distribution patterns of C. cirripediformis and produced a global risk map for its outbreak under current and future climate scenarios using the Maximum Entropy (MaxEnt) model. Our results showed that mean temperature of driest quarter (Bio 9), precipitation of coldest quarter (Bio 19), precipitation of warmest quarter (Bio 18), and mean temperature of wettest quarter (Bio 8) were the main factors influencing the current modeled distribution of C. cirripediformis, respectively, contributing 41.9, 29.4, 18.8, and 7.9%. The models predicted that, globally, potential distribution of C. cirripediformis would be across most zoogeographical regions under both current and future climate scenarios. Moreover, in the future, both the total potential distribution region and its area of highly suitable habitat are expected to expand slightly in all representative concentration pathway scenarios. The information generated from this study will contribute to better identify the impacts of climate change upon C. cirripediformis’s potential distribution while also providing a scientific basis for forecasting insect pest spread and outbreaks. Furthermore, this study serves an early warning for the regions of potential distribution, predicted as highly suitable habitats for this pest, which could promote its prevention and control.

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Potential Suitable Habitat of Two Economically Important Forest Trees (Acer truncatum and Xanthoceras sorbifolium) in East Asia under Current and Future Climate Scenarios

Forests ◽

10.3390/f12091263 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (9) ◽

pp. 1263

Author(s):

Yaoxing Wu ◽

Yong Yang ◽

Chen Liu ◽

Yixuan Hou ◽

Suzhi Yang ◽

...

Keyword(s):

East Asia ◽

Loess Plateau ◽

Inner Mongolia ◽

Future Climate ◽

Suitable Habitat ◽

Forest Trees ◽

Climate Scenarios ◽

Xanthoceras Sorbifolium ◽

Suitable Habitats ◽

Inner Mongolia Plateau

Acer truncatum Bunge and Xanthoceras sorbifolium Bunge are small deciduous trees distributed in East Asia and have high ecological and nutrient value due to their strong environmental adaptability and seed oil abundant in nervonic acid and unsaturated fatty acids. However, their natural distribution remains unclear, which will also be affected by the changing climatic conditions. The main purpose of this study was to map and predict the current and future potential suitable habitats of these two species using MaxEnt based on the presence location of species and environmental variables. The results showed that A. truncatum was more suitable for warm and humid climates and was more durable to climate change compared to X. sorbifolium. Under the current environmental conditions, the suitable habitat of A. truncatum was mainly concentrated in Inner Mongolia Plateau, Loess Plateau, Sichuan Basin, Northeast Plain, North China Plain, Korean Peninsula, as well as Japan, with an area of 115.39 × 104 km2. X. sorbifolium was mainly distributed in Inner Mongolia Plateau and Loess Plateau with an area of 146.15 × 104 km2. Under future climate scenarios, the model predicted that higher concentrations of greenhouse gas emissions could result in greater expansion of the potential distribution of both species. Meanwhile, the study also revealed that the two species migrated to the north by east to varying degrees with the change in suitable habitats. This work could provide scientific basis for resource protection and utilization of the two economic forest trees.

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Ensemble Models Predict Invasive Bee Habitat Suitability Will Expand under Future Climate Scenarios in Hawai’i

Insects ◽

10.3390/insects12050443 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (5) ◽

pp. 443

Author(s):

Jesse A. Tabor ◽

Jonathan B. Koch

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Invasive Species ◽

Habitat Suitability ◽

Future Climate ◽

Disease Spread ◽

Suitable Habitat ◽

Climate Scenarios ◽

Distribution Models ◽

Invasive Range ◽

The Impact

Climate change is predicted to increase the risk of biological invasions by increasing the availability of climatically suitable regions for invasive species. Endemic species on oceanic islands are particularly sensitive to the impact of invasive species due to increased competition for shared resources and disease spread. In our study, we used an ensemble of species distribution models (SDM) to predict habitat suitability for invasive bees under current and future climate scenarios in Hawai’i. SDMs projected on the invasive range were better predicted by georeferenced records from the invasive range in comparison to invasive SDMs predicted by records from the native range. SDMs estimated that climatically suitable regions for the eight invasive bees explored in this study will expand by ~934.8% (±3.4% SE). Hotspots for the invasive bees are predicted to expand toward higher elevation regions, although suitable habitat is expected to only progress up to 500 m in elevation in 2070. Given our results, it is unlikely that invasive bees will interact directly with endemic bees found at >500 m in elevation in the future. Management and conservation plans for endemic bees may be improved by understanding how climate change may exacerbate negative interactions between invasive and endemic bee species.

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Upward Shifts in Ageratina adenophora Global Distributions in Response to Future Climate Change Scenarios

10.22541/au.161235641.13177081/v1 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Changjun Gu ◽

Tu Yanli ◽

Linshan Liu ◽

Wei Bo ◽

Yili Zhang ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Potential Distribution ◽

Future Climate ◽

Future Climate Change ◽

Suitable Habitat ◽

Climate Change Scenarios ◽

Altitudinal Distribution ◽

Invasive Weed ◽

Crofton Weed ◽

Ageratina Adenophora

Aim: Invasive alien species (IAS) threaten ecosystems and humans worldwide, and future climate change may accelerate the expansion of IAS. Predicting the suitable distributions of IAS can prevent their further expansion. Ageratina adenophora is a invasive weed over 30 countries in tropical and subtropical regions. However, the potential suitable distribution of A. adenophora remains unclear along with its response to climate change. This study explored and mapped the current and future potential distributions of Ageratina adenophora. Location: Global Taxa: Asteraceae A. adenophora (Spreng.) R.M.King & H.Rob. Commonly known as Crofton weed. Methods: Based on A. adenophora occurrence data and climate data, we predicted its potential distribution of this weed under current and future (four RCPs in 2050 and 2070) by MaxEnt model. We used ArcGIS 10.4 to explore the distribution characteristics of this weed and the ‘ecospat’ package in R to analyse its altitudinal distribution changes. Results: The area under the curve value (>0.9) indicated excelled model performance. Among environment factors, Mean Temperature of Coldest Quarter contributed most to the model. Globally, the suitable habitat for A.adenophora invasion decreased under climate change scenarios, although regional increase were observed, including in six biodiversity hotspot regions. The potential suitable habitat of A.adenophora under climate change moved toward regions with higher elevation. Main Conclusions: Temperature was the most important variable influencing the distribution of A. Adenophora. Under the background of warming climate, the potential distribution range of A.adenophora will shrink globally but increase regionally. The distribution of A.adenophora will shift toward higher elevation under climate change. Mountain ecosystems are of special concern as they are rich in biodiversity and sensitive to climate change, and increasing human activities provide more opportunities for IAS invasion.

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Dynamics of soil organic carbon in the steppes of Russia and Kazakhstan under past and future climate and land use

Regional Environmental Change ◽

10.1007/s10113-021-01799-7 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 21 (3) ◽

Author(s):

Susanne Rolinski ◽

Alexander V. Prishchepov ◽

Georg Guggenberger ◽

Norbert Bischoff ◽

Irina Kurganova ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Land Use ◽

Organic Carbon ◽

Land Use Change ◽

Soil Organic Carbon ◽

Arable Land ◽

Future Climate ◽

Future Climate Change ◽

Climate Scenarios ◽

The Impact

AbstractChanges in land use and climate are the main drivers of change in soil organic matter contents. We investigated the impact of the largest policy-induced land conversion to arable land, the Virgin Lands Campaign (VLC), from 1954 to 1963, of the massive cropland abandonment after 1990 and of climate change on soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks in steppes of Russia and Kazakhstan. We simulated carbon budgets from the pre-VLC period (1900) until 2100 using a dynamic vegetation model to assess the impacts of observed land-use change as well as future climate and land-use change scenarios. The simulations suggest for the entire VLC region (266 million hectares) that the historic cropland expansion resulted in emissions of 1.6⋅ 1015 g (= 1.6 Pg) carbon between 1950 and 1965 compared to 0.6 Pg in a scenario without the expansion. From 1990 to 2100, climate change alone is projected to cause emissions of about 1.8 (± 1.1) Pg carbon. Hypothetical recultivation of the cropland that has been abandoned after the fall of the Soviet Union until 2050 may cause emissions of 3.5 (± 0.9) Pg carbon until 2100, whereas the abandonment of all cropland until 2050 would lead to sequestration of 1.8 (± 1.2) Pg carbon. For the climate scenarios based on SRES (Special Report on Emission Scenarios) emission pathways, SOC declined only moderately for constant land use but substantially with further cropland expansion. The variation of SOC in response to the climate scenarios was smaller than that in response to the land-use scenarios. This suggests that the effects of land-use change on SOC dynamics may become as relevant as those of future climate change in the Eurasian steppes.

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