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Niche shift can impair the ability to predict invasion risk in the marine realm: an illustration using Mediterranean fish invaders
Author(s) -
Parravicini Valeriano,
Azzurro Ernesto,
Kulbicki Michel,
Belmaker Jonathan
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
ecology letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 6.852
H-Index - 265
eISSN - 1461-0248
pISSN - 1461-023X
DOI - 10.1111/ele.12401
Subject(s) - niche , ecological niche , ecology , range (aeronautics) , environmental niche modelling , invasive species , biology , climate change , mediterranean basin , species distribution , mediterranean climate , habitat , materials science , composite material
Climatic niche conservatism, the tendency of species‐climate associations to remain unchanged across space and time, is pivotal for forecasting the spread of invasive species and biodiversity changes. Indeed, it represents one of the key assumptions underlying species distribution models ( SDM s), the main tool currently available for predicting range shifts of species. However, to date, no comprehensive assessment of niche conservatism is available for the marine realm. We use the invasion by Indo‐Pacific tropical fishes into the Mediterranean Sea, the world's most invaded marine basin, to examine the conservatism of the climatic niche. We show that tropical invaders may spread far beyond their native niches and that SDM s do not predict their new distributions better than null models. Our results suggest that SDM s may underestimate the potential spread of invasive species and call for prudence in employing these models in order to forecast species invasion and their response to environmental change.