Habitat management is essential for the conservation of wildlife, especially cranes. Here, we collected occurrence data at wintering grounds for four cranes （Leucogeranus leucogeranus, Grus monacha, Antigone vipio an...Habitat management is essential for the conservation of wildlife, especially cranes. Here, we collected occurrence data at wintering grounds for four cranes （Leucogeranus leucogeranus, Grus monacha, Antigone vipio and G. grus） and analyzed associated environmental variables to model and project overall potential wintering habitat using Maxent. ENMTools was used to calculate the degree of niche overlap among cranes. Results showed that lakes in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River are main habitats for the four focal species. Inland water and coastal wetlands in Jiangsu are also potential wintering areas. G. grus spreads over central and eastern China. The four cranes show tight niche overlap in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River. Poyang Lake is one of the most important habitat sites for all four cranes, according to modeling and niche overlap results. Poyang Lake is cut into a dozen nature reserves, but a bigger nature reserve or system would be more effective for cranes. The conservation of these four crane species will be improved on the basis of this study.展开更多
Aims This study explores the patterns of niche differentiation in a group of seven closely related columbines(genus Aquilegia,ranunculaceae)from the Iberian Peninsula.Populations of these columbines are subject to com...Aims This study explores the patterns of niche differentiation in a group of seven closely related columbines(genus Aquilegia,ranunculaceae)from the Iberian Peninsula.Populations of these columbines are subject to complex patterns of divergent selection across environ-ments,which partly explain the taxonomic structure of the group.This suggests the hypothesis that niche divergence must have occurred along the process of diversification of the group.Methods We used maxEnt to build environmental niche models of seven subspecies belonging to the three species of Aquilegia present in the Iberian Peninsula.From these models,we compared the envi-ronmental niches through two different approaches:ENmtools and multivariate methods.Important FindingsmaxEnt distributions conformed closely to the actual distribution of the study taxa.ENmtools methods failed to uncover any clear patterns of niche differentiation or conservatism in Iberian columbines.multivariate analyses indicate the existence of dif-ferentiation along altitudinal gradients and along a gradient of climatic conditions determined by the summer precipitation and temperatures.However,climatic conditions related to winter tem-perature and precipitation,as well as soil properties,were equally likely to show conservatism or divergence.The complex patterns of niche evolution we found suggest that Iberian Columbines have not been significantly constrained by forces of niche conservatism,so they could respond adaptively to the fast and profound climate changes in the Iberian Peninsula through the glacial cycles of the Pleistocene.展开更多
基金Major State Basic Research Development Program of China(973 ProgramGrant No.2012CB417005)
文摘Habitat management is essential for the conservation of wildlife, especially cranes. Here, we collected occurrence data at wintering grounds for four cranes （Leucogeranus leucogeranus, Grus monacha, Antigone vipio and G. grus） and analyzed associated environmental variables to model and project overall potential wintering habitat using Maxent. ENMTools was used to calculate the degree of niche overlap among cranes. Results showed that lakes in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River are main habitats for the four focal species. Inland water and coastal wetlands in Jiangsu are also potential wintering areas. G. grus spreads over central and eastern China. The four cranes show tight niche overlap in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River. Poyang Lake is one of the most important habitat sites for all four cranes, according to modeling and niche overlap results. Poyang Lake is cut into a dozen nature reserves, but a bigger nature reserve or system would be more effective for cranes. The conservation of these four crane species will be improved on the basis of this study.
基金Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación(MICINN,project CGL2006-02848)FEDER funds of the European CommissionMICINN grant(BES-2007-16060 to R.J.).
文摘Aims This study explores the patterns of niche differentiation in a group of seven closely related columbines(genus Aquilegia,ranunculaceae)from the Iberian Peninsula.Populations of these columbines are subject to complex patterns of divergent selection across environ-ments,which partly explain the taxonomic structure of the group.This suggests the hypothesis that niche divergence must have occurred along the process of diversification of the group.Methods We used maxEnt to build environmental niche models of seven subspecies belonging to the three species of Aquilegia present in the Iberian Peninsula.From these models,we compared the envi-ronmental niches through two different approaches:ENmtools and multivariate methods.Important FindingsmaxEnt distributions conformed closely to the actual distribution of the study taxa.ENmtools methods failed to uncover any clear patterns of niche differentiation or conservatism in Iberian columbines.multivariate analyses indicate the existence of dif-ferentiation along altitudinal gradients and along a gradient of climatic conditions determined by the summer precipitation and temperatures.However,climatic conditions related to winter tem-perature and precipitation,as well as soil properties,were equally likely to show conservatism or divergence.The complex patterns of niche evolution we found suggest that Iberian Columbines have not been significantly constrained by forces of niche conservatism,so they could respond adaptively to the fast and profound climate changes in the Iberian Peninsula through the glacial cycles of the Pleistocene.
