Abstract
Over the past centuries, humans have transformed large parts of the biosphere, and there is a growing need to understand and predict the distribution of biodiversity hotspots influenced by the presence of humans. Our basic hypothesis is that human influence in the Anthropocene is ubiquitous, and we predict that biodiversity hot spot modeling can be improved by addressing three challenges raised by the increasing ecological influence of humans: (i) anthropogenically modified responses to individual ecological factors, (ii) fundamentally different processes and predictors in landscape types shaped by different land use histories and (iii) a multitude and complexity of natural and anthropogenic processes that may require many predictors and even multiple models in different landscape types. We modeled the occurrence of veteran oaks in Norway, and found, in accordance with our basic hypothesis and predictions, that humans influence the distribution of veteran oaks throughout its range, but in different ways in forests and open landscapes. In forests, geographical and topographic variables related to the oak niche are still important, but the occurrence of veteran oaks is shifted toward steeper slopes, where logging is difficult. In open landscapes, land cover variables are more important, and veteran oaks are more common toward the north than expected from the fundamental oak niche. In both landscape types, multiple predictor variables representing ecological and human‐influenced processes were needed to build a good model, and several models performed almost equally well. Models accounting for the different anthropogenic influences on landscape structure and processes consistently performed better than models based exclusively on natural biogeographical and ecological predictors. Thus, our results for veteran oaks clearly illustrate the challenges to distribution modeling raised by the ubiquitous influence of humans, even in a moderately populated region, but also show that predictions can be improved by explicitly addressing these anthropogenic complexities.
Highlights
Global change implies an urgent need to better understand and assess the effects of human land management on biodiversity-rich ecosystems and habitats (Erb et al, 2017; Souza, Teixeira, & Ostermann, 2015; Titeux et al, 2016)
We focus on large and hollow oaks (Quercus spp.; Figure 1)—an important biodiversity hot spot habitat in northern Europe—to address the challenge of interacting ecological and anthropogenic processes in generating spatial patterns in biodiversity hotspots
We found that the distribution of veteran oaks was influenced by a mixture of ecological and anthropogenic factors, and that different processes dominated in forests and open landscapes
Summary
Global change implies an urgent need to better understand and assess the effects of human land management on biodiversity-rich ecosystems and habitats (Erb et al, 2017; Souza, Teixeira, & Ostermann, 2015; Titeux et al, 2016). Veteran trees in Europe are often legacies from a preindustrial, extensively managed agricultural landscape, and owe some of their qualities to previous human management, like coppicing Due to their rich microhabitat structures (thick bark, crevices, dead branches, hollows etc.), these veteran trees are important landscape elements, but often constitute local hotspots for biodiversity in themselves (Sverdrup-Thygeson, 2009). | 3 exceptionally species-r ich communities associated with wood decay and wood mold flourish For these reasons, veteran oaks are a priority conservation habitat, and for both conservation research and management of these large old trees it is important to know where they are likely to be found and how they are influenced by ecological and anthropogenic processes (Lindenmayer & Laurance, 2016; Lindenmayer et al, 2014). Because of the multiple ecological and anthropogenic drivers, we expect that the distribution of veteran oaks is better predicted with multiple predictors and models, combined in coherence with the structure of the landscape
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