10.5061/DRYAD.D51C5B058
Jarvie, Scott
0000-0002-0086-2351
Otago Regional Council
Ingram, Travis
University of Otago
Chapple, David
Monash University
Hitchmough, Rodney
Department of Conservation
Nielsen, Stuart
Florida Museum of Natural History
Monks, Joanne M.
Department of Conservation
Variable vulnerability to climate change in New Zealand lizards
Dryad
dataset
2021
FOS: Biological sciences
Biodiversity
Climate change
Biodiversity
Climate change
ectotherm
ecological niche model
Department of Conservation
https://ror.org/03mh7j916
2022-01-06T00:00:00Z
2022-01-06T00:00:00Z
en
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5802861
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5802863
9507684 bytes
4
CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication
Aim: The primary drivers of species and population extirpations have been
habitat loss, overexploitation, and invasive species, but human-mediated
climate change is expected to be a major driver in future. To minimise
biodiversity loss, conservation managers should identify species
vulnerable to climate change and prioritise their protection. Here, we
estimate climatic suitability for two speciose taxonomic groups, then use
phylogenetic analyses to assess vulnerability to climate change. Location:
Aotearoa New Zealand (NZ) Taxa: NZ lizards: diplodactylid geckos and
eugongylinae skinks Methods: We built correlative species distribution
models (SDMs) for NZ geckos and skinks to estimate climatic suitability
under current climate and 2070 future-climate scenarios. We then used
Bayesian phylogenetic mixed models (BPMMs) to assess vulnerability for
both groups with predictor variables for life history traits (body size
and activity phase) and current distribution (elevation and latitude). We
explored two scenarios: an unlimited dispersal scenario, where projections
track climate, and a no-dispersal scenario, where projections are
restricted to areas currently identified as suitable. Results: SDMs
projected vulnerability to climate change for most modelled lizards. For
species’ ranges projected to decline in climatically suitable areas,
average decreases were between 42–45% for geckos and 33–91% for skinks,
although area did increase or remain stable for a minority of species. For
the no-dispersal scenario, the average decrease for geckos was 37–52% and
for skinks was 33–52%. Our BPMMs showed phylogenetic signal in climate
change vulnerability for both groups, with elevation increasing
vulnerability for geckos, and body size reducing vulnerability for skinks.
Main conclusions: NZ lizards showed variable vulnerability to climate
change, with most species’ ranges predicted to decrease. For species whose
suitable climatic space is projected to disappear from within their
current range, managed relocation could be considered to establish
populations in regions that will be suitable under future climates.
Although GPS coordinates for current populations are not included due to
the potential threat of poaching, the climate variables for each species
are provided. The records for extant gecko and skinks mainly came from the
New Zealand's Department of Conervation Herpetofauna Database. After
updating the taxonomy and cleaning the data to reflect the taxonomy as at
2019 of 43 geckos speceis recognised across seven genera and 61 species in
genus, we then thinned the occurrence records at a 1 km resolution for all
species then predicted distributions for those with > 15 records
using species distribution models. The climate variables for each species
were selected among annual mean temperature (bio1), maximum temperature of
the warmest month (bio5), minimum temperature of the coldest month (bio6),
mean temperature of driest quarter (bio9), mean temperature of wettest
quarter (bio10), and precipitation of the driest quarter (bio17). To
reduce multicollinearity in species distribution models for each species,
we only retained climate variables with a variable inflation factor
< 10. The climate variables were from the CHELSA database
(https://chelsa-climate.org/), which can be freely downloaded for current
and future scenarios. We also provide MCC tree files for the geckos and
skinks. The phylogenetic trees have been constructed for NZ geckos by
(Nielsen et al., 2011) and for NZ skinks by (Chapple et al., 2009). For
geckos we used a subset of the sequences used by Nielsen et al. (2011) for
four genes, two nuclear (RAG 1, PDC) and two mitochondrial (16S, ND2 along
with flanking tRNA sequences). For skinks, we used sequences from Chapple
et al. (2009) for one nuclear (RAG 1) and five mitochondrial (ND2, ND4,
Cyt b, 12S and 16S) genes, and additional ND2 sequences for taxa not
included in the original phylogeny (Chapple et al., 2011, p. 201). In
total we used sequences for all recognised extant taxa (Hitchmough et al.,
2016) as at 2019 except for three species of skink (O. aff. inconspicuum
“Okuru”, O. robinsoni, and O. aff. inconspicuum “North Otago”) and two
species of gecko (M. “Cupola” and W. “Kaikouras”) for which genetic data
were not available.