Exposure of western United States bird communities to predicted high severity fire.

ABSTRACT: Fire is a pervasive biogeographic process that shapes biodiversity globally and is now experiencing unprecedented changes. Despite well documented impacts of fires on biodiversity, we do not know where biodiversity might be most vulnerable to changing fire regimes. We leverage recent advancements in fire forecasting and species distribution modeling to assess the exposure of bird species richness, community uniqueness, and functional richness to altered fire regimes in the western United States. We find that 55-58% of biodiversity hotspots are classified as "refugia", where high biodiversity intersects with predicted low severity burn areas. In contrast, 24-30% of biodiversity hotspots are classified as "areas of concern", where high biodiversity intersected with predicted high severity bu

SUBMITTER: Norman KE 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12917125 | biostudies-literature | 2026 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature