A process to support species conservation planning and climate change readiness in protected areas

Abstract –Global change will cause species range shifts, affecting species interactions. The 13 conservation implications of species range shifts are widely unknown. Through forming an 14 ecology-bioinformatics partnership at the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center-Encyclopedia 15 of Life-Biodiversity Heritage Library Research Sprint, we developed an analytical pipeline to 16 test whether global trends are forcing shifts of mutually dependent species in different spatial 17 directions. We calculated potential overlap between dependent species across climate scenarios 18 within protected areas. We selected the Great Green Macaw (Ara ambiguus) and its nesting host 19 tree the Giant Almendro (Dipteryx panamensis) as a proof-of-concept species pair that will be 20 affected by range shifts. We demonstrate with modeling that the Great Green Macaw will lose 21 approximately 64.0% of suitable habitat in future scenarios, while the Giant Almendro will lose 22 59.7% of suitable habitat. Species habitat overlaps across 85.3 % of its currently predicted 23 distribution and 69.07% of the remaining habitat predicted in future scenarios. After accounting 24 for spatially explicit protected areas networks, only 20.3% and 40.2 % of remaining habitat 25 persists within protected areas across climate scenarios for the Almendro and Macaw, 26 respectively, and 19.9 % of that habitat overlaps between the species. Currently, we are 27 conducting a literature review to select and expand our list of species for use in the pipeline to 28 detect trends for climate readiness planning in protected areas networks. The analytical pipeline 29 will produce habitat suitability maps for multiple climate scenarios based on current 30 distributions, and these maps will potentially be embedded into the Encyclopedia of Life as free, 31 downloadable files. This is just one of several broader impact products from the research. This 32 work demonstrates that modeling the future distribution of species is limited by biotic 33 interactions and that conservation planning should account for climate change scenarios. 34 35