Open AccessPredicting community rank‐abundance distributions under current and future climates
Author(s) -
McCarthy James K.,
Mokany Karel,
Ferrier Simon,
Dwyer John M.
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
ecography
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.973
H-Index - 128
eISSN - 1600-0587
pISSN - 0906-7590
DOI - 10.1111/ecog.03552
Subject(s) - species richness , abundance (ecology) , species evenness , sclerophyll , ecology , biodiversity , context (archaeology) , climate change , geography , relative abundance distribution , rank abundance curve , vegetation (pathology) , rainforest , relative species abundance , environmental science , biology , medicine , archaeology , pathology , mediterranean climate
Understanding influences of environmental change on biodiversity requires consideration of more than just species richness. Here we present a novel framework for understanding possible changes in species' abundance structures within communities under climate change. We demonstrate this using comprehensive survey and environmental data from 1748 woody plant communities across southeast Queensland, Australia, to model rank‐abundance distributions (RADs) under current and future climates. Under current conditions, the models predicted RADs consistent with the region's dominant vegetation types. We demonstrate that under a business as usual climate scenario, total abundance and richness may decline in subtropical rainforest and shrubby heath, and increase in dry sclerophyll forests. Despite these opposing trends, we predicted evenness in the distribution of abundances between species to increase in all vegetation types. By assessing the information rich, multidimensional RAD, we show that climate‐driven changes to community abundance structures will likely vary depending on the current composition and environmental context.