Quantifying climate sensitivity and climate-driven change in North American amphibian communities

Published in Nature Communications, 2018

Recommended citation: Miller, D.A.W., Grant, E.H.C, Muths, E., Amburgey, S.M., Adams, M.J., Joseph, M.B., Waddle, J.H., Johnson, P.T. J., Ryan, M.E., Schmidt, B.R., Calhoun, D.L., Davis, C.L., Fisher, R.N., Green, D.M., Hossack, B.R., Rittenhouse, T.A.G., Walls, S.C., Bailey, L.L., Cruickshank, S.S., Fellers, G.M., Gorman, T.A., Haas, C.A., Hughson, W., Pilliod, D.S., Price, S.J., Ray, A.M., Sadinski, W., Saenz, D., Barichivich, W.J., Brand, A., Brehme, C.S., Dagit, R., Delaney, K.S., Glorioso, B.M., Kats, L.B., Kleeman, P.M., Pearl, C.A., Rochester, C.J., Riley, S.P.D., Roth, M., Sigafus, B.H. (2019). Quantifying climate sensitivity and climate-driven change in North American amphibian communities. Nature Communications. 9(1):3926 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-06157-6

Abstract

Changing climate will impact species’ ranges only when environmental variability directly impacts the demography of local populations. However, measurement of demographic responses to climate change has largely been limited to single species and locations. Here we show that amphibian communities are responsive to climatic variability, using >500,000 time-series observations for 81 species across 86 North American study areas. The effect of climate on local colonization and persistence probabilities varies among eco-regions and depends on local climate, species life-histories, and taxonomic classification. We found that local species richness is most sensitive to changes in water availability during breeding and changes in winter conditions. Based on the relationships we measure, recent changes in climate cannot explain why local species richness of North American amphibians has rapidly declined. However, changing climate does explain why some populations are declining faster than others. Our results provide important insights into how amphibians respond to climate and a general framework for measuring climate impacts on species richness. Amphibians have seen large population declines, but the key drivers are hard to establish. Here, Miller et al. investigate trends of occupancy for 81 species of amphibians across North America and find greater sensitivity to water availability during breeding and winter conditions than mean climate.

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