Current and future potential habitat suitability prediction of an endemic freshwater fish species Seminemacheilus lendlii (Hankó, 1925) using Maximum Entropy Modelling (MaxEnt) under climate change scenarios: implications for conservation

Climate change is one of the important phenomena of the century. Species distribution models have become very popular in recent years for conservation planning. When making management and conservation plans for a species, it is essential to know the current and future distributions. Expected temperature and precipitation changes will significantly affect the distribution areas of the species. These changes may result in habitat losses for some species and habitat expansion for others. This study, which current and future distribution area of Seminemacheilus lendlii, occurred in a very narrow area in Turkey, which is categorized as ‘Vulnerable’ by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) was explored. Bioclimatic variables (Bio 1-19) were applied to determine the habitat suitability of S. lendlii under a current and a future (CCSM4, RCP’s 2.6, 4.5, and 8.5 2070) scenario using MaxEnt software. The most influential variables were respectively bio_15, bio_14, bio_8, bio_4, bio_3, and the environmental variable that decreases the gain the most when it is omitted was the precipitation seasonality (Coefficient of Variation) (bio_15). S. lendlii is a sensitive species, with a not endurance to environmental stress. As a result of the modeling, it has been observed that there will be a significant decrease in the suitable habitats until 2070.