The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.
ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Conserv. Sci.
Sec. Animal Conservation
Volume 5 - 2024 |
doi: 10.3389/fcosc.2024.1412440
This article is part of the Research Topic Long-Term Research on Avian Conservation Ecology in the Age of Global Change and Citizen Science View all 3 articles
Climate-Driven Distributional Shifts in Chocó Endemic Birds of Southwest Colombia
Provisionally accepted- 1 Universidade Estadual de Santa Cruz, Ilhéus, Brazil
- 2 The University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah, United States
- 3 Los Colibrís de Altaquer Ecological Foundation, Altaquer, Colombia
Climate change poses a significant threat to bird communities, forcing species to either shift their distributions or face local extinctions. Forest-dwelling and narrowly distributed species are expected to experience more drastic range contractions and face higher extinction risks compared to widely distributed and open-area species. In this study, we focused on the Chocó region in southwestern Colombia, recognized as a biodiversity hotspot with the highest concentration of endemic birds globally. We used eBird occurrence records and climate data to predict potential changes in the distributions of 27 endemic and near-endemic bird species under both low and high greenhouse gas emission scenarios for 2050 and 2070. We assessed these projected distributions against currently forested and protected areas to understand future conservation needs. Nearly all species are projected to lose climate-suitable areas in at least one future scenario, leading to a decrease in regional species richness. Species richness variation suggests higher losses and gains near the Colombia-Ecuador border, indicating possible range shifts to higher elevations. The proportion of suitable areas within forested and protected areas is considerably smaller compared to the total range of our study species, emphasizing the need to safeguard regions that are expected to maintain natural vegetation and suitable climatic conditions in the future. At the species level, the Scarlet-and-white Tanager (Chrysothlypis salmoni) is projected to face the greatest loss in total climate suitable area, as well as within protected and forested areas. To mitigate these potential losses, expanding the protected area network and ensuring the conservation of key forested regions is crucial for enabling species to keep pace with climate change. By providing projected distribution maps and potential elevational range shifts for 27 Neotropical birds, our results underscore the value of modelling future distributions of tropical montane species to forecast potential regional climate-driven extirpations and aid in conservation planning for at-risk species and the ecological services they provide.
Keywords: Global Warming, Population decline, Forest cover, Neotropics, tropical ornithology, KBA Río Ñambí, conservation biology
Received: 04 Apr 2024; Accepted: 31 Oct 2024.
Copyright: © 2024 Mota, Kittelberger, Paí and Şekercioğlu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Flávio M. Mota, Universidade Estadual de Santa Cruz, Ilhéus, Brazil
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.