Mapping evolutionary process: a multi‐taxa approach to conservation prioritization

Human‐induced land use changes are causing extensive habitat fragmentation. As a result, many species are not able to shift their ranges in response to climate change and will likely need to adapt in situ to changing climate conditions. Consequently, a prudent strategy to maintain the ability of pop...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Evolutionary applications 2011-03, Vol.4 (2), p.397-413
Main Authors: Thomassen, Henri A., Fuller, Trevon, Buermann, Wolfgang, Milá, Borja, Kieswetter, Charles M., Jarrín‐V., Pablo, Cameron, Susan E., Mason, Eliza, Schweizer, Rena, Schlunegger, Jasmin, Chan, Janice, Wang, Ophelia, Peralvo, Manuel, Schneider, Christopher J., Graham, Catherine H., Pollinger, John P., Saatchi, Sassan, Wayne, Robert K., Smith, Thomas B.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Andes
Bats
Biodiversity
Biogeography
Climate change
Complementarity
Conservation
Conservation biology
conservation prioritization
ecological modeling
Ecology
Ecuador
Environmental changes
Evolution
evolutionary process
generalized dissimilarity modeling
Genetic diversity
Geography
Habitat fragmentation
Land use
landscape genetics
Morphology
Nature
Original
Phylogenetics
Phylogeography
Remote sensing
species distribution
Species richness
Trends
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Request full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Human‐induced land use changes are causing extensive habitat fragmentation. As a result, many species are not able to shift their ranges in response to climate change and will likely need to adapt in situ to changing climate conditions. Consequently, a prudent strategy to maintain the ability of populations to adapt is to focus conservation efforts on areas where levels of intraspecific variation are high. By doing so, the potential for an evolutionary response to environmental change is maximized. Here, we use modeling approaches in conjunction with environmental variables to model species distributions and patterns of genetic and morphological variation in seven Ecuadorian amphibian, bird, and mammal species. We then used reserve selection software to prioritize areas for conservation based on intraspecific variation or species‐level diversity. Reserves selected using species richness and complementarity showed little overlap with those based on genetic and morphological variation. Priority areas for intraspecific variation were mainly located along the slopes of the Andes and were largely concordant among species, but were not well represented in existing reserves. Our results imply that in order to maximize representation of intraspecific variation in reserves, genetic and morphological variation should be included in conservation prioritization.
ISSN:1752-4571
1752-4571
DOI:10.1111/j.1752-4571.2010.00172.x