Effects of climate change and land cover on the distributions of a critical tree family in the Philippines.

ABSTRACT: Southeast Asian forests are dominated by the tree family Dipterocarpaceae, whose abundance and diversity are key to maintaining the structure and function of tropical forests. Like most biodiversity, dipterocarps are threatened by deforestation and climate change, so it is crucial to understand the potential impacts of these threats on current and future dipterocarp distributions. We developed species distribution models (SDMs) for 19 species of dipterocarps in the Philippines, which were projected onto current and two 2070 representative concentration pathway (RCP) climate scenarios, RCP 4.5 and 8.5. Current land cover was incorporated as a post-hoc correction to restrict projections onto intact habitats. Land cover correction alone reduced current species distributions by a median 67%, a

SUBMITTER: Pang SEH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7801684 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature