Abstract
AbstractAimProtected areas (PAs) play an important role in biodiversity conservation, but remain increasingly threatened by invasive alien plant species (IAPS) in conjunction with global climate change. The latter is modifying the distribution of the former, and the magnitude and direction of distributional changes are predicted to vary depending on species dispersal mode. Here, we address the question of whether clonality is expected to affect the future invasion pattern in PAs.LocationWorldwide.Time period1950–2100.Major taxa studied36 invasive alien plant species.MethodsWe used ensembles of three species distribution models (GLM, GAM and Maxent) based on >70,000 occurrence records to project the distribution of 36 of the world's most invasive clonal and non‐clonal plants in >20,000 PAs. Projections were based on three greenhouse gas concentration scenarios (low, medium and high) for 2080.ResultsClimate change showed little impact on the global invasion pattern in PAs, and clonality showed little effect when all biomes were processed in concert. However, we discerned that the future invasion risk of clonal IAPS markedly increased in biomes located at high elevation and high latitude compared with non‐clonal IAPS, while the risk decreased in lower‐elevation tropical and subtropical biomes where asexual reproduction may be a less successful trait. We also showed that invasion hot spots overlapped with biodiversity hot spots and two realms (i.e. Nearctic and Palearctic), which calls for bridging the gap between invasion and conservation sciences and for more concerted management strategies.Main conclusionsWe suggest that effective management of IAPS in PAs should consider in which biomes PAs are located as well as the reproductive traits of IAPS that are present or may become so.
Highlights
Global climate change has the potential to alter the distribution of many organisms, including invasive alien species (Bellard et al, 2017; Bradley et al, 2010; Parepa et al, 2013; Shrestha & Shrestha, 2019)
We split this set of species into clonal and non-clonal categories and assessed their current probability to invade global protected areas (PAs) distributed in 16 biomes and seven realms as well as their future invasion risk under three climate change scenarios
We addressed the following questions. (a) Will climate change affect the prevalence of the worst invasive alien plant species (IAPS) in PAs at the global scale? (b) Will this change be evenly distributed across biomes? (c) Will this change be the same among clonal and non-clonal plants?
Summary
Global climate change has the potential to alter the distribution of many organisms, including invasive alien species (Bellard et al, 2017; Bradley et al, 2010; Parepa et al, 2013; Shrestha & Shrestha, 2019). Bellard et al, 2014; Burgess et al, 2017; Gillard et al, 2017; Osawa et al, 2019; Wan & Wang, 2018) used species distribution modellings (SDMs) to the distributions of these world's worst invasive plants These studies only established correlative SDMs based on effects of environmental changes on IAPS distributions using presence and absence points. We modelled the current and future distribution of 36 plant species found in the list of “100 of the world's worst invasive alien species” established by the Invasive Species Specialist Group (Lowe et al, 2000) We split this set of species into clonal and non-clonal categories and assessed their current probability to invade global PAs distributed in 16 biomes and seven realms as well as their future invasion risk under three climate change scenarios. We addressed the following questions. (a) Will climate change affect the prevalence of the worst IAPS in PAs at the global scale? (b) Will this change be evenly distributed across biomes? (c) Will this change be the same among clonal and non-clonal plants?
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