Abstract
Ostrya rehderiana is a famous plant species with extremely small populations. With ongoing global climate change, the extremely small populations would face more uncertainties and risks, including the loss of genetic diversity and extirpation. Thus, assessing the impact of climate change on suitable habitat of O. rehderiana is particularly important for its conservation and restoration. Here, we built niche models with climate variables and soil and human footprint variables. Furthermore, new methods were applied to avoid confounding effects between climate and soil and human footprint variables to simulate the potential habitats of O. rehderiana in current and future climates. We found that the Hargreaves climatic moisture deficit, degree-days below 0 °C, chilling degree-days, and the temperature difference between mean warmest month temperature and mean coldest month temperature, or continentality, were the most important climate factors. The topsoil USDA texture classification, topsoil cation exchange capacity of (clay), and topsoil sodicity (ESP) were the key soil factors determining the suitable distribution of O. rehderiana. Compared with soil factors, human footprint has less influence on the suitable distribution of O. rehderiana. The niche range of this species was projected to expand and shift to north in the Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 4.5 scenario for the 2050s. Our study results could be referenced in further extremely small populations ecological restoration studies and provide the scientific strategies for the conservation and restoration of O. rehderiana.
Highlights
Our results showed that the suitability geographic distribution of O. rehderiana difference between MWMT and MCMT, or continentality) and soil
Our findings identified that O. rehderiana suitable habitat has been limited by some soil variables, including T_USDA_TEX_CLASS, T-CEC-CLAY, and T-CEC-SOIL, which were found to effectively contribute modeling the species distribution
Our results showed that the climate model predicted a narrower range than the combined soil and human footprint model, indicating that climatic variables are the main determinant limiting the distribution of O. rehderiana
Summary
1. Introduction with regard to jurisdictional claims in Climate is a key ecological factor determining species range distribution; the anticipated suitable habitat shift (latitude and/or elevation) in response to climate change is imminent [1,2,3]. Characterized by small remaining populations, restricted habitat, and extremely high risk of extinction, PSESPs have been identified as a conservation priority in the fields of published maps and institutional affiliations. The spatial mapping of human footprint is significantly related to species extinction risk [11]. Considering soil and human footprint during modeling of species suitable habitats prediction produced better results to those solely based on climate variables [15] as they provide better a framework for understanding the complex impacts of environmental change on PSESPs [16,17].
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