Zonal Species' Niche Shifts to Climate Change in Yanhe River Catchment

摘要

Global climate warming is expected to cause systematic shifts in the distribution of species and consequently increase extinction risk. Conservation managers must be able to detect measure and accurately predict such impacts of climate change on species in order to mitigate impacts on biodiversity and ecological restoration. Here we use generalized additive model (GAM), combining with GIS spatial analyst, to predict the zonal species distribution in Yanhe River catchment and quantify the drifts of species niche center in main environmental gradients under six climate change scenarios in 2050. Results show that the changes of species distribution under six climate change scenarios are consistent. With the increase in temperature, the potential distribution of species will shift toward northern, and the species niche center drift to higher temperature gradient; Species distribution has the same response to climate change in precipitation gradient. But different species responded differently to climate change, Species with restricted ranges are more likely to be sensitive to climate change than widespread species. The conclusion of the study is of great importance to regional species protection or ecological restoration.