scholarly journals Conservation strategies to mitigate impacts from climate change in Amazonia

2008 ◽  
Vol 363 (1498) ◽  
pp. 1881-1888 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy J Killeen ◽  
Luis A Solórzano
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Environmental Gradients ◽  
Species Conservation ◽  
Climate Extremes ◽  
Habitat Diversity ◽  
Conservation Strategies ◽  
Humid Forest ◽  
Infrastructure Investments ◽  
Conservation Corridors ◽  
The Impact

Protected area systems and conservation corridors can help mitigate the impacts of climate change on Amazonian biodiversity. We propose conservation design criteria that will help species survive in situ or adjust range distributions in response to increased drought. The first priority is to protect the western Amazon, identified as the ‘Core Amazon’, due to stable rainfall regimes and macro-ecological phenomena that have led to the evolution of high levels of biodiversity. Ecotones can buffer the impact from climate change because populations are genetically adapted to climate extremes, particularly seasonality, because high levels of habitat diversity are associated with edaphic variability. Future climatic tension zones should be surveyed for geomorphological features that capture rain or conserve soil moisture to identify potential refugia for humid forest species. Conservation corridors should span environmental gradients to ensure that species can shift range distributions. Riparian corridors provide protection to both terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. Multiple potential altitudinal corridors exist in the Andes, but natural and anthropogenic bottlenecks will constrain the ability of species to shift their ranges and adapt to climate change. Planned infrastructure investments are a serious threat to the potential to consolidate corridors over the short and medium term.

scholarly journals A review of climatic change as a determinant of the viability of koala populations

2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (7) ◽  
pp. 458 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hailee J. Reckless ◽  
Michael Murray ◽  
Mathew S. Crowther
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climate Extremes ◽  
Habitat Destruction ◽  
Toxic Chemicals ◽  
Conservation Strategies ◽  
Local Conservation ◽  
Phascolarctos Cinereus ◽  
Low Genetic Diversity ◽  
Anthropogenic Processes ◽  
The Impact

The koala (Phascolarctos cinereus) occupies a broad range of eastern and southern Australia, extending over tropical coastal, semiarid inland and temperate regions. In many areas koala populations are under threat, in particular from the direct and indirect effects of ongoing habitat destruction due to increased urbanisation and other anthropogenic processes. Climate change presents additional threats to the integrity of koala habitats because many species of food and non-food trees have narrow climate envelopes and are unable to adapt to altered temperatures and rainfall. Climate extremes also produce physiological stresses in koalas that may increase the likelihood of outbreaks of chlamydiosis and other diseases. Climate change–related increases in the relative content of toxic chemicals in leaves are further stresses to the koala after ingestion. In addition, populations that originated from a small number of founder individuals are at potential risk due to their relatively low genetic diversity. Strategies that maintain residual habitat fragments and promote the construction of new refugia are now being formulated. Modelling of the impact of habitat metrics on koala distribution is providing important information that can be used in the rehabilitation of koala refugia. In future these models could be augmented with metrics that describe koala homeostasis to inform local conservation strategies. These considerations are also relevant for the maintenance of other taxa in the wider ecosystem that are also at risk from habitat destruction and climate change.

scholarly journals Exploring farmers’ perception on climate-induced events and adaptation practices to protect crop production and livestock farming in Haor area of northeastern Bangladesh

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tasneem Chowdhury Fahim ◽  
Bivuti Bhushan Sikder
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Crop Production ◽  
Coastal Region ◽  
Climate Extremes ◽  
Livestock Farming ◽  
Chi Square ◽  
Study Results ◽  
Tools And Techniques ◽  
Adaptation Practices ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Bangladesh is confronting terrible impacts of climate change on agriculture across the country, especially in the low-lying area like- Haor, coastal region, and islands. This behavioral study (N = 320) examines the perception and knowledge of farmers on climate-induced events and experiences, and explores the adaptation practices they adopt to protect crop production and livestock farming from the impact of climate change in the Northeastern Haor area of the country. Using triangulation method, it is detected that farmers of the study area have erroneous idea on climate change and the causes of frequent climate extremes. Study results show that respondents’ perception and experiences on climate-induced event are verified positively with the historical trend and time-series analysis of climate indicators as well as with the findings of researchers using PRA tools and techniques. This study explores the traditional and systematic adaptation approaches of farmers which are practiced in individual or community level. The rationale of each of the approach from respondents’ side is also analyzed in the study. It is statistically tested using chi-square that some of the scientific and systematic adaptation options for crop production is predominantly influenced by the educational qualifications of the respondents. The study reveals that lack of proper information prevents subsistence farmers to find the most effective adaptation pathways.

Evaluating the effect of climate change on snow load on structures

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pietro Croce ◽  
Paolo Formichi ◽  
Filippo Landi ◽  
Francesca Marsili
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climate Models ◽  
Regional Climate ◽  
Climate Extremes ◽  
Regional Climate Models ◽  
Extreme Weather Events ◽  
Uncertainty Range ◽  
Greenhouse Gasses ◽  
Weather Events ◽  
The Impact

<p>As consequence of global warming extreme weather events might become more frequent and severe across the globe. The evaluation of the impact of climate change on extremes is then a crucial issue for the resilience of infrastructures and buildings and is a key challenge for adaptation planning. In this paper, a suitable procedure for the estimation of future trends of climatic actions is presented starting from the output of regional climate models and taking into account the uncertainty in the model itself. In particular, the influence of climate change on ground snow loads is discussed in detail and the typical uncertainty range is determined applying an innovative algorithm for weather generation. Considering different greenhouse gasses emission scenarios, some results are presented for the Italian Mediterranean region proving the ability of the method to define factors of change for climate extremes also allowing a sound estimate of the uncertainty range associated with different models.</p>

Populations, communities, and conservation

2020 ◽  
pp. 140-154
Author(s):  
Graham Scott
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Range Expansion ◽  
Population Change ◽  
Size Structure ◽  
Conservation Strategies ◽  
Habitat Availability ◽  
Natural Range ◽  
Avian Diseases ◽  
The Impact

In this final chapter populations, population change, and population regulation are discussed, particularly in the context of threats to species and the conservation strategies employed to protect them. Population size, structure, and distribution in relation to ecology and habitat availability are analysed. The movements and establishment of species through natural range expansion and through introduction are considered in the context of climate change, conservation, and threat. The impact and management of emerging avian diseases is discussed. Extinction, the threat of extinction, and conservation efforts are considered and throughout the chapter the roles of professional and citizen scientist ornithologists are emphasized.

scholarly journals Suitability of lichens to monitor climate change

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rajesh Bajpai ◽  
Manoj Semwal ◽  
C. P. Singh
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climatic Change ◽  
Uv Radiation ◽  
Climatic Factors ◽  
Environmental Gradients ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Atmospheric Temperature ◽  
Frequency Diversity ◽  
Temperature Influence ◽  
The Impact

The lichens are one of the most sensitive organism in nature among the different elements of biodiversity and can be affected more due to climate change. Lichens fulfil their water need from rain, fog and dew present in the atmosphere. The change in atmospheric temperature influence, to a greater extent, the thallus temperature and physiology of lichens which leads to emergence of new ecotype and finally the shift in a species. The impact of climatic factors on lichens ecophysiology, is different from higher plantsis due to the poikilohydric nature. The lichen bioindicator communities have been shown to exhibit correlation with climatic factors of an area. The changes in lichen biomass, frequency, diversity and indicatorcommunity indices, indicate changes in environmental gradients (temperature, humidity and UV radiation). A number of techniques regarding study the environmental and climatic change are available. However, the present correspondence hypothesized about some easy and low cost techniques to monitor climate change utilizing lichens. The overview will also leads to assess patterns of lichens responses with species representation and towards its understanding the current and future changes in climate of an area.

Exploring the role of lags and legacies in the productivity of Australian ecosystems

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jon Page ◽  
Martin De Kauwe ◽  
Gab Abramowitz
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climate Extremes ◽  
Multiple Time Scales ◽  
Plant Responses ◽  
Multiple Time ◽  
Legacy Effects ◽  
Ecological Memory ◽  
Using Data ◽  
The Impact

&lt;p&gt;The vegetation&amp;#8217;s response to climate change is a major source of uncertainty in terrestrial biosphere model (TBM) projections. Constraining carbon cycle feedbacks to climate change requires improving our understanding of both the direct plant physiological responses to global change, as well as the role of legacy effects (e.g. reductions in plant growth, damage to the plant&amp;#8217;s hydraulic transport system), that drive multi-timescale feedbacks. In particular, the role of these legacy effects - both the timescale and strength of the memory effect - have been largely overlooked in the development of model hypotheses. This is despite the knowledge that plant responses to climatic drivers occur across multiple time scales (seconds to decades), with the impact of climate extremes (e.g. drought) resonating for many years. Using data from 13 eddy covariance sites, covering two rainfall gradients in Australia, in combination with a hierarchical Bayesian model, we characterised the timescales of influence of antecedent drivers on fluxes of net carbon exchange and evapotranspiration. Using our data assimilation approach we were able to partition the influence of ecological memory into both biological and environmental components. Overall, we found that the importance of ecological memory to antecedent conditions increased as water availability declines. Our results therefore underline the importance of capturing legacy effects in TBMs used to project responses in water limited ecosystems.&lt;/p&gt;

scholarly journals The Impact of Climate Change and Climate Extremes on Sugarcane Production

GCB Bioenergy ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sophie Flack‐Prain ◽  
Liangsheng Shi ◽  
Penghui Zhu ◽  
Humberto R. da Rocha ◽  
Osvaldo Cabral ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climate Extremes ◽  
Sugarcane Production ◽  
Impact Of Climate Change ◽  
The Impact

Surrogate climate change projections for the Lake Victoria region with a convection-permitting model.

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonas Van de Walle ◽  
Oscar Brousse ◽  
Roman Brogli ◽  
Matthias Demuzere ◽  
Wim Thiery ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Lake Victoria ◽  
Climate Extremes ◽  
Extreme Weather ◽  
Climate Projections ◽  
Lake Victoria Basin ◽  
Complex Behaviour ◽  
Severe Thunderstorms ◽  
Ensemble Mean ◽  
The Impact

&lt;p align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;Extreme weather is posing constant threat to more than 30 million people living near Lake Victoria or depending on its resources. Thousands of fishermen die every year by severe thunderstorms and associated water currents, while hazardous over-land thunderstorms largely affect people living inland, continuously facing flood risks. These risks call for better understanding of such climate extremes over the region. Climate models are a useful tool to gain insight in the complex behaviour of thunderstorms, especially when simulated at convection-permitting resolution. Such simulations, explicitly resolving deep convection at fine resolutions, have been shown to improve the representation of extreme events in many parts of the world, also in equatorial East-Africa (Finney et al., 2019; Kendon et al., 2019; Van de Walle et al., 2019). As a response, the CORDEX-Flagship Pilot Study &amp;#8220;climate extremes in the Lake Victoria basin&amp;#8221; (ELVIC) initiative is currently setting up an ensemble of convection-permitting simulations over the region.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;At this stage, future climate projections are needed to assess the impact of anthropogenic climate change on extreme weather the region. Therefore, a surrogate global warming approach following Sch&amp;#228;r et al. (1996), Kr&amp;#246;ner et al. (2016), Liu et al. (2016) and Rasmussen et al. (2017) has been applied to a convection-permitting COSMO-CLM simulation. In this approach, the lateral boundary conditions from the ERA5 (~31 km resolution) reanalysis are perturbed in accordance with the recent CMIP6 ensemble-mean end-of-century SSP5 8.5 climate change scenario. This approach confers three major advantages over the more conventional methods. First, by perturbing with the ensemble-mean, it excludes uncertainties of GCMs without the need for a time and computational intensive high resolution ensemble approach. Second, it avoids including present-day circulation biases. Third, no intermediate nesting steps are necessary, as the perturbed ERA5 allows a direct downscaling to the convection-permitting climate projection.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;Besides the methodology, results for the Lake Victoria basin will be presented. Although the occurrence of extreme over-lake precipitation in the present-day climate is mostly controlled by large- and mesoscale atmospheric dynamics (Van de Walle et al., 2019), its future intensification is mainly attributed to increased humidity (Thiery et al., 2016). Furthermore, the effect of changed large-scale dynamics is assessed, as not only temperature and humidity, but also wind forcing is modified.&lt;/p&gt;

scholarly journals Modelling of climate change impact on flow conditions in the lowland anastomosing river

PeerJ ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. e9275
Author(s):  
Paweł Marcinkowski ◽  
Dorota Mirosław-Świątek
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Assessment Tool ◽  
Traditional Approach ◽  
Hydraulic Modeling ◽  
Freshwater Ecosystems ◽  
Low Flow ◽  
Ecosystem Functions ◽  
Conservation Strategies ◽  
Flow Conditions ◽  
The Impact

The progressive degradation of freshwater ecosystems worldwide requires action to be taken for their conservation. Nowadays, protection strategies need to step beyond the traditional approach of managing protected areas as they have to deal with the protection or recovery of natural flow regimes disrupted by the effects of future climate conditions. Climate change affects the hydrosphere at catchment scale altering hydrological processes which in turn impact hydrodynamics at the river reach scale. Therefore, conservation strategies should consider mathematical models, which allow for an improved understanding of ecosystem functions and their interactions across different spatial and temporal scales. This study focuses on an anastomosing river system in north-eastern Poland, where in recent decades a significant loss of the anabranches has been observed. The objective was to assess the impact of projected climate change on average flow conditions in the anastomosing section of the Narew River. The Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT software) for the Narew catchment was coupled with the HEC-RAS one-dimensional unsteady flow model. The study looked into projected changes for two future time horizons 2021–2050 and 2071–2100 under the Representative Concentration Pathway 4.5 using an ensemble of nine EURO-CORDEX model scenarios. Results show that low flow conditions in the anastomosing section of the Narew National Park will remain relatively stable in 2021–2050 compared to current conditions and will slightly increase in 2071–2100. Duration of low flows, although projected to decrease on an annual basis, will increase for August–October, when the loss on anastomoses was found to be the most intense. Hydraulic modeling indicated extremely low flow velocities in the anastomosing arm (<0.1 m/s) nowadays and under future projections which is preferable for in-stream vegetation development and their gradual sedimentation and closure.

scholarly journals Effect of climate change on the potential distribution of Heloderma alvarezi (Squamata, Helodermatidae)

ZooKeys ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 1070 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Aarón Gómez-Cruz ◽  
Nancy G. Santos-Hernández ◽  
José Alberto Cruz ◽  
Daniel Ariano-Sánchez ◽  
Christian Ruiz-Castillejos ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Potential Distribution ◽  
Current Data ◽  
Conservation Strategies ◽  
Suitable Habitat ◽  
Case Scenario ◽  
Worst Case ◽  
Human Footprint ◽  
Bioclimatic Variables ◽  
The Impact

Climate change represents a real threat to biodiversity conservation worldwide. Although the effects on several species of conservation priority are known, comprehensive information about the impact of climate change on reptile populations is lacking. In the present study, we analyze outcomes on the potential distribution of the black beaded lizard (Heloderma alvarezi Bogert &amp; Martin del Campo, 1956) under global warming scenarios. Its potential distribution, at present and in projections for the years 2050 and 2070, under both optimistic and pessimistic climate change forecasts, were computed using current data records and seven bioclimatic variables. General results predict a shift in the future potential distribution of H. alvarezi due to temperature increase. The optimistic scenario (4.5 W/m2) for 2070 suggests an enlargement in the species’ distribution as a response to the availability of new areas of suitable habitat. On the contrary, the worst-case scenario (7 W/m2) shows a distribution decrease by 65%. Moreover, the range distribution of H. alvarezi is directly related to the human footprint, which consequently could magnify negative outcomes for this species. Our research elucidates the importance of conservation strategies to prevent the extinction of the black beaded lizard, especially considering that this species is highly threatened by aversive hunting.

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