Dataset Information

Geographical variation in species' population responses to changes in temperature and precipitation.

ABSTRACT: Despite increasing concerns about the vulnerability of species' populations to climate change, there has been little overall synthesis of how individual population responses to variation in climate differ between taxa, with trophic level or geographically. To address this, we extracted data from 132 long-term (greater than or equal to 20 years) studies of population responses to temperature and precipitation covering 236 animal and plant species across terrestrial and freshwater habitats. Our results identify likely geographical differences in the effects of climate change on populations and communities in line with macroecological theory. Temperature tended to have a greater overall impact on populations than precipitation, although the effects of increased precipitation varied strongly with latitude, being most positive at low latitudes. Population responses to increased temperature were generally positive, but did not vary significantly with latitude. Studies reporting significant climatic trends through time tended to show more negative effects of temperature and more positive effects of precipitation upon populations than other studies, indicating climate change has already impacted many populations. Most studies of climate change impacts on biodiversity have focused on temperature and are from middle to high northern latitudes. Our results suggest their findings may be less applicable to low latitudes.

SUBMITTER: Pearce-Higgins JW

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4650153 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Geographical variation in species' population responses to changes in temperature and precipitation.

Pearce-Higgins James W JW Ockendon Nancy N Baker David J DJ Carr Jamie J White Elizabeth C EC Almond Rosamunde E A RE Amano Tatsuya T Bertram Esther E Bradbury Richard B RB Bradley Cassie C Butchart Stuart H M SH Doswald Nathalie N Foden Wendy W Gill David J C DJ Green Rhys E RE Sutherland William J WJ Tanner Edmund V J EV

Proceedings. Biological sciences 20151101 1818

Despite increasing concerns about the vulnerability of species' populations to climate change, there has been little overall synthesis of how individual population responses to variation in climate differ between taxa, with trophic level or geographically. To address this, we extracted data from 132 long-term (greater than or equal to 20 years) studies of population responses to temperature and precipitation covering 236 animal and plant species across terrestrial and freshwater habitats. Our re ...[more]

PMID: 26511054

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Project description:Land-use and climate change are two of the primary drivers of the current biodiversity crisis. However, we lack understanding of how single-species and multispecies associations are affected by interactions between multiple environmental stressors. We address this gap by examining how environmental degradation interacts with daily stochastic temperature variation to affect individual life history and population dynamics in a host-parasitoid trophic interaction, using the Indian meal moth, Plodia interpunctella, and its parasitoid wasp Venturia canescens. We carried out a single-generation individual life-history experiment and a multigeneration microcosm experiment during which individuals and microcosms were maintained at a mean temperature of 26°C that was either kept constant or varied stochastically, at four levels of host resource degradation, in the presence or absence of parasitoids. At the individual level, resource degradation increased juvenile development time and decreased adult body size in both species. Parasitoids were more sensitive to temperature variation than their hosts, with a shorter juvenile stage duration than in constant temperatures and a longer adult life span in moderately degraded environments. Resource degradation also altered the host's response to temperature variation, leading to a longer juvenile development time at high resource degradation. At the population level, moderate resource degradation amplified the effects of temperature variation on host and parasitoid populations compared with no or high resource degradation and parasitoid overall abundance was lower in fluctuating temperatures. Top-down regulation by the parasitoid and bottom-up regulation driven by resource degradation contributed to more than 50% of host and parasitoid population responses to temperature variation. Our results demonstrate that environmental degradation can strongly affect how species in a trophic interaction respond to short-term temperature fluctuations through direct and indirect trait-mediated effects. These effects are driven by species differences in sensitivity to environmental conditions and modulate top-down (parasitism) and bottom-up (resource) regulation. This study highlights the need to account for differences in the sensitivity of species' traits to environmental stressors to understand how interacting species will respond to simultaneous anthropogenic changes.

Dataset Information

Geographical variation in species' population responses to changes in temperature and precipitation.

Publications

Geographical variation in species' population responses to changes in temperature and precipitation.

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