[PCA] Climate Change - evolution and range shifts

[De Angelis, Patricia]

A couple of new climate change articles along with some older related ones
as food for thought...

Patricia S. De Angelis, Ph.D.
Botanist, Division of Scientific Authority-US Fish & Wildlife
Service-International Affairs
Chair, Medicinal Plant Working Group-Plant Conservation Alliance
4401 N. Fairfax Dr., Suite 110
Arlington, VA  22203
703-358-1708 x1753
FAX: 703-358-2276

Promoting sustainable use and conservation of our native medicinal plants.
<www.nps.gov/plants/medicinal>

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*Abundance, distribution, and population trends of the iconic Hawaiian
Honeycreeper, the ʻIʻiwi (Vestiaria coccinea) throughout the Hawaiian
Islands <http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2013/1150/>:* Based on the most recent
surveys (up to 2012), approximately 50 percent of ʻIʻiwi live in a narrow,
500-meter band at elevations of 1,200–1,700 meters, suggesting that ʻIʻiwi
are vulnerable to future shifts in climate.  *(Paxton, E.H., Gorresen,
P.M., and Camp, R.J., 2013, U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report
2013-1150, 59 p.  The URL for this publication is **
http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2013/1150/* <http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2013/1150/>*)*

RELATED:

*Evolutionary Consequences of Extinctions in Populations of a Hawaiian
Honeycreeper:  *We report on the evolutionary change in bill size of a
species of Hawaiian honeycreeper resulting from an apparent dietary shift
caused by dramatic declines and extinctions of lobelioids, a historically
favored nectar source. Although it now feeds mainly on the flowers of the
ohia tree (*Metrosideros polymorpha*), early Hawaiian avifaunal accounts
report that the i’iwi (*Vestiaria coccinea*), which has a long decurved
bill, fed primarily on the flowers of Hawaiian Lobelioideae, which
typically have long decurved corollas. A coevolutionary association of
i’iwi bill and flower morphology has often been asserted. We test the
hypothesis that the shift in the i’iwi’s diet from the long corolla
lobelioid flowers to ohia flowers, which lack corollas, resulted in
directional selection for shorter bills. We evaluate this hypothesis by
comparing the morphological characters of museum specimens from the island
of Hawaii collected before 1902 with recent specimens from the Hakalau
National Wildlife Refuge, Hawaii. We examine evidence of change in
morphological characters using multivariate analysis and a nonparametric
cubic spline technique. Results from all analyses are congruent: bill
length is shorter in recent specimens. *(Thomas B. Smith, Leonard A. Freed,
Jaan Kaimanu Lepson and John H. Carothers**. 1995. Conservation BIology
9(1):107-113. Available for a fee at http://www.jstor.org/stable/2386392)*

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*Dramatic response to climate change in the Southwest: Robert Whittaker's
1963 Arizona Mountain plant transect
revisited*<http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ece3.720/abstract?systemMessage=Wiley+Online+Library+will+be+disrupted+on+31+August+from+10%3A00-12%3A00+BST+%2805%3A00-07%3A00+EDT%29+for+essential+maintenance>
*:*  This research provides the first documentation of significant upward
shifts of lower elevation range boundaries in Southwestern montane plant
species over decadal time, confirming that previous hypotheses are correct
in their prediction that mountain communities in the Southwest will be
strongly impacted by warming, and that the Southwest is already
experiencing a rapid vegetation change.  Researchers reexamined Robert
Whittaker's 1963 plant transect in the Santa Catalina Mountains of southern
Arizona, finding that this process is already well underway. Our survey,
five decades after Whittaker's, reveals large changes in the elevational
ranges of common montane plants, while mean annual rainfall has decreased
over the past 20 years, and mean annual temperatures increased
0.25°C/decade from 1949 to 2011 in the Tucson Basin. Although elevational
changes in species are individualistic, significant overall upward movement
of the lower elevation boundaries, and elevational range contractions, have
occurred. *(Brusca et al., Ecology and Evolution, 2013; DOI: **
10.1002/ece3.720* <http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ece3.720>*)*

RELATED:

*Evidence that local land use practices influence regional climate,
vegetation, and stream flow patterns  in adjacent natural
areas<http://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/r-198.pdf>.
*Stohlgren et al. presented evidence that land use practices, in the plains
of Colorado, influence regional climate and vegetation in adjacent natural
areas of the Rocky Mountains in predictable ways. The results of the
mesoscale climate model simulations were consistent with coarser resolution
RAMS simulations for the coterminous United States, that indicated that
land use change caused July temperatures to decrease in the vicinity of the
southern Rocky Mountains and increase in the eastern central Great Plains.
Those coarser-resolution simulations also showed July precipitation to
increase over the mountains of Colorado and decrease over the eastern
Colorado plains under current landscapes compared to natural vegetation
cover. The authors corroborate the RAMS simulations with three independent
sets of data: (1) climate records from 16 weather stations, (2) the
distribution of seedlings of five dominant conifer species in Rocky
Mountain National Park, which suggested that cooler, wetter conditions
occurred over roughly the same time period; and (3) increased stream flow
during the summer months in four river basins, which also indicates cooler
summer temperatures and lower transpiration at landscape scales. Combined,
the mesoscale atmospheric/land-surface model, short-term trends in regional
temperatures, forest distribution changes, and hydrology data indicate that
the effects of land use practices on regional climate may overshadow
larger-scale temperature changes commonly associated with observed
increases in CO2 and other greenhouse gases.* *(Stohlgren, T.J., T.N.
Chase, R.A. Pielke, T.G.F. Kittel, and J. Baron, 1998: * *Global Change
Biology, 4, 495-504.
http://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/r-198.pdf)**

RELATED:

*Changes in Climatic Water Balance Drive Downhill Shifts in Plant Species’
Optimum Elevations <http://www.sciencemag.org/content/331/6015/324.full.pdf>
* Uphill shifts of species’ distributions in response to historical warming
are well documented, which leads to widespread expectations of continued
uphill shifts under future warming. Conversely, downhill shifts are often
considered anomalous and unrelated to climate change. By comparing the
altitudinal distributions of 64 plant species between the 1930s and the
present day within California, we show that climate changes have resulted
in a significant downward shift in species’ optimum elevations. This
downhill shift is counter to what would be expected given 20th-century
warming but is readily explained by species’ niche tracking of regional
changes in climatic water balance rather than temperature. Similar downhill
shifts can be expected to occur where future climate change scenarios
project increases in water availability that outpace evaporative demand. (Shawn
M. Crimmins, Solomon Z. Dobrowski,  Jonathan A. Greenberg, John T.
Abatzoglou, Alison R. Mynsberge, 2011:. Science, 21 January 2011: 324-327.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/331/6015/324.full.pdf)




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