Ecological niche modelling predicts significant impacts of future climate change on two endemic rodents in eastern Africa
Main Article Content
Abstract
The impact of climate change on rodents is well studied, however, many of these studies are restricted to the Americas. Small- to medium-sized rodents, especially murids, are restricted in their home range and microclimatic niche breadth, and are known to be more sensitive to changes in bioclimatic conditions over time. We analyzed the effect of future climatic scenarios in the near and distant future, using two global climate models (CanESM5 and MIROC-ES2L) for two shared socio-economic pathways (SSP2-4.5 and SSP5-8.5), on two eastern Africa endemic small-bodied mice: Stenocephalemys albipes and Mastomys awashensis. Our results indicate that while S. albipes showed increases in area of climatic suitability in the future, M. awashensis is predicted to suffer severe decline in the area of its fundamental niche.
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors own the copyright to the articles published in JoTT. This is indicated explicitly in each publication. The authors grant permission to the publisher Wildlife Information Liaison Development (WILD) Society to publish the article in the Journal of Threatened Taxa. The authors recognize WILD as the original publisher, and to sell hard copies of the Journal and article to any buyer. JoTT is registered under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY), which allows authors to retain copyright ownership. Under this license the authors allow anyone to download, cite, use the data, modify, reprint, copy and distribute provided the authors and source of publication are credited through appropriate citations (e.g., Son et al. (2016). Bats (Mammalia: Chiroptera) of the southeastern Truong Son Mountains, Quang Ngai Province, Vietnam. Journal of Threatened Taxa 8(7): 8953–8969. https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.2785.8.7.8953-8969). Users of the data do not require specific permission from the authors or the publisher.
References
Assefa, A. & C. Srinivasulu (2019). Comparison of rodent community between natural and modified habitats in Kafta-Sheraro National Park and its adjoining villages, Ethiopia: implication for conservation. Journal of Basic and Applied Zoology 80, Article number: 59. https://doi.org/10.1186/s41936-019-0128-9 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s41936-019-0128-9
Aiello-Lammens, M.E., R.A. Boria, A. Radosavljevic, B. Vilela & R.P. Anderson (2015). spThin: an R package for spatial thinning of species occurrence records for use in ecological niche models. Ecography 38(5): 541–545. https://doi.org/10.1111/ecog.01132 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ecog.01132
Bean, W.T., L.R. Prugh, R. Stafford, H.S. Butterfield, M. Westphal & J.S. Brashares (2014). Species distribution models of an endangered rodent offer conflicting measures of habitat quality at multiple scales. Journal of Applied Ecology 51(4): 1116–1125. https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.12281 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.12281
Cameron, G.N. & D. Scheel (2001). Getting Warmer: Effect of Global Climate Change on Distribution of Rodents in Texas. Journal of Mammalogy 82(3): 652–680. https://doi.org/10.1644/1545-1542(2001)082<0652:GWEOGC>2.0.CO;2 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1644/1545-1542(2001)082<0652:GWEOGC>2.0.CO;2
Corti, M., R. Castiglia, P. Colangelo, E. Capanna, F. Beolchini, A. Bekele, N. Oguge, R. Makundi, S. Sichilima, H. Leirs, V. Verheyen, V. & R. Verhagen (2005). Cytotaxonomy of rodent species from Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania and Zambia. Belgian Journal of Zoology 135: 197–216.
Elith, J., C.H. Graham, R.P. Anderson, M. Dudík, S. Ferrier, A. Guisan, R.J. Hijmans, F. Huettmann, J.R. Leathwick, A. Lehmann, J. Li, L.G. Lohmann, B.A. Loiselle, G. Manion, C. Moritz, M. Nakamura, Y. Nakazawa, J.M.M. Overton, A.T. Peterson, S.J. Phillips, K. Richardson, R. Scachetti‐Pereira, R.E. Schapire, J. Soberón, S. Williams, M.S. Wisz & N.E. Zimmermann (2006). Novel methods improve prediction of species’ distributions from occurrence data. Ecography 29(2): 129–151. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2006.0906-7590.04596.x DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2006.0906-7590.04596.x
Evans, J.S. (2020). spatialEco [R package] (Version 1.3-1)
Feng, X., D.S. Park, C. Walker, A.T. Peterson, C. Merow & M. Papeş (2019). A checklist for maximizing reproducibility of ecological niche models. Nature Ecology & Evolution 3(10): 1382–1395. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-019-0972-5 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-019-0972-5
Fick, S.E. & R.J. Hijmans (2017). WorldClim 2: new 1‐km spatial resolution climate surfaces for global land areas. International Journal of Climatology 37(12): 4302–4315. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.5086 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.5086
Fischer, C., C. Gayer, K. Kurucz, F. Riesch, T. Tscharntke & P. Batáry (2018). Ecosystem services and disservices provided by small rodents in arable fields: Effects of local and landscape management. Journal of Applied Ecology 55(2): 548–558. https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.13016 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.13016
Flores-Zamarripa, F.J. & J.A. Fernández (2018). Predictive species distribution model of two endemic kangaroo rats from Mexico: Dipodomys ornatus and D. phillipsii (Rodentia: Heteromyidae). Therya 9(3): 237–246. https://doi.org/10.12933/therya-18-605 DOI: https://doi.org/10.12933/therya-18-605
Fricko, O., P. Havlik, J. Rogelj, Z. Klimont, M. Gusti, N. Johnson, P. Kolp, M. Strubegger, H. Valin, M. Amann, T. Ermolieva, N. Forsell, M. Herrero, C. Heyes, G. Kindermann, V. Krey, D.L. McCollum, M. Obersteiner, S. Pachauri, S. Rao, E. Schmid, W. Schoepp & K. Riahi (2017). The marker quantification of the Shared Socioeconomic Pathway 2: A middle-of-the-road scenario for the 21st century. Global Environmental Change 42: 251–267. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2016.06.004 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2016.06.004
Habtamu, T. & A. Bekele (2008). Habitat association of insectivores and rodents of Alatish National Park, northwestern Ethiopia. Tropical Ecology 49(1): 1–11.
Happold, D.C.D. & J. Kingdon (eds.) (2013). Mammals of Africa. Vol. 3: Rodents, Hares and Rabbits. Bloomsbury, London, 784pp.
Hutchinson, G.E. (1957). Concluding Remarks. Cold Spring Harbor Symposia on Quantitative Biology 22(0): 415–427. https://doi.org/10.1101/SQB.1957.022.01.039 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1101/SQB.1957.022.01.039
Kassa, D. & A. Bekele (2008). Species composition, abundance, distribution and habitat association of rodents of Wondo Genet, Ethiopia. SINET: Ethiopian Journal of Science 31(2): 141–146. https://doi.org/10.4314/sinet.v31i2.66637 DOI: https://doi.org/10.4314/sinet.v31i2.66637
Kasso, M., A. Bekele & G. Hemson (2010). Species composition, abundance and habitat association of rodents and insectivores from Chilalo-Galama Mountain range, Arsi, Ethiopia: Small mammals of Chilalo-Galama Mountains. African Journal of Ecology 48(4): 1105–1114. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2028.2010.01222.x DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2028.2010.01222.x
Keller, E.F. & E.A. Lloyd (eds.) (1999). Keywords in Evolutionary Biology. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 414pp.
Kingdon, J. (1997). The Kingdon Field Guide to African Mammals. Academic Press, San Diego, London, Boston, 459pp.
Kriegler, E., N. Bauer, A. Popp, F. Humpenöder, M. Leimbach, J. Strefler, L. Baumstark, B.L. Bodirsky, J. Hilaire, D. Klein, I. Mouratiadou, I. Weindl, C. Bertram, J.-P. Dietrich, G. Luderer, M. Pehl, R. Pietzcker, F. Piontek, H. Lotze-Campen, A. Biewald, M. Bonsch, A. Giannousakis, U. Kreidenweis, C. Müller, S. Rolinski, A. Schultes, J. Schwanitz, M. Stevanovic, K. Calvin, J. Emmerling, S. Fujimori, S. & O. Edenhofer (2017). Fossil-fueled development (SSP5): An energy and resource intensive scenario for the 21st century. Global Environmental Change 42: 297–315. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2016.05.015 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2016.05.015
Kubiak, B.B., E.E. Gutiérrez, D. Galiano, R. Maestri & T.R.O. de Freitas (2017). Can niche modeling and geometric morphometrics document competitive exclusion in a pair of subterranean rodents (Genus Ctenomys) with tiny parapatric distributions? Scientific Reports 7(1): 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-16243-2 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-16243-2
Lavrenchenko, L.A., O.P. Likhnova, M.I. Baskevich & A. Bekele (1998). Systematics and distribution of Mastomys (Muridae, Rodentia) from Ethiopia, with the description of a new species. Zeitschrift Für Säugetierkunde 63: 37–51.
Leroy, B., C.N. Meynard, C. Bellard & F. Courchamp (2016). Virtualspecies, an R package to generate virtual species distributions. Ecography 39(6): 599–607. https://doi.org/10.1111/ecog.01388 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ecog.01388
Martínez-Salazar, E.A., T. Escalante, M. Linaje & J. Falcón-Ordaz (2013). Predicting the potential distribution of Vexillata (Nematoda: Ornithostrongylidae) and its hosts (Mammalia: Rodentia) within America. Journal of Helminthology 87(4): 400–408. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022149X12000612 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022149X12000612
Martynov, A.A., J. Bryja, Y. Meheretu & L.A. Lavrenchenko (2020). Multimammate mice of the genus Mastomys (Rodentia: Muridae) in Ethiopia – diversity and distribution assessed by genetic approaches and environmental niche modelling. Journal of Vertebrate Biology 69(2): 1–16. https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.20006 DOI: https://doi.org/10.25225/jvb.20006
McDonough, M.M., R. Šumbera, V. Mazoch, A.M. Ferguson, C.D. Phillips & J. Bryja (2015). Multilocus phylogeography of a widespread savanna-woodland-adapted rodent reveals the influence of Pleistocene geomorphology and climate change in Africa’s Zambezi region. Molecular Ecology 24(20): 5248–5266. https://doi.org/10.1111/mec.13374 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/mec.13374
Meheretu, Y., V. Sluydts, K. Welegerima, H. Bauer, M. Teferi, G. Yirga, L. Mulungu, M. Haile, J. Nyssen, J. Deckers, R. Makundi & H. Leirs (2014). Rodent abundance, stone bund density and its effects on crop damage in the Tigray highlands, Ethiopia. Crop Protection 55: 61–67. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cropro.2013.10.016 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cropro.2013.10.016
Merow, C., M.J. Smith & J.A. Silander (2013). A practical guide to MaxEnt for modeling species’ distributions: what it does, and why inputs and settings matter. Ecography 36(10): 1058–1069. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1600-0587.2013.07872.x DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1600-0587.2013.07872.x
Millien, V. & J. Damuth (2004). Climate change and size evolution in an island rodent species: new perspectives on the island rule. Evolution 58(6): 1353. https://doi.org/10.1554/03-727 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1554/03-727
Monadjem, A. (2015). Rodents of Sub-Saharan Africa: A Biogeographic and Taxonomic Synthesis. Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin, Boston, 1,092pp. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110301915
Muscarella, R., P.J. Galante, M. Soley-Guardia, R.A. Boria, J.M. Kass, M. Uriarte & R.P. Anderson (2014). ENMeval: An R package for conducting spatially independent evaluations and estimating optimal model complexity for MaxEnt ecological niche models. Methods in Ecology and Evolution 5(11): 1198–1205. https://doi.org/10.1111/2041-210X.12261 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/2041-210X.12261
Nowak, R.M. (1999). Walker’s Mammals of the World, 6th edition. The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 2pp.
Ortega-Huerta, M.A. & A.T. Peterson (2008). Modeling ecological niches and predicting geographic distributions: a test of six presence-only methods. Revista Mexicana de Biodiversidad 79: 205–216.
Pardi, M.I., R.C. Terry, E.A. Rickart & R.J. Rowe (2020). Testing climate tracking of montane rodent distributions over the past century within the Great Basin ecoregion. Global Ecology and Conservation 24: e01238. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gecco.2020.e01238 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gecco.2020.e01238
Phillips, S.J., R.P. Anderson & R.E. Schapire (2006). Maximum entropy modeling of species geographic distributions. Ecological Modelling 190(3–4): 231–259. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2005.03.026 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2005.03.026
Porfirio, L. L., R.M.B. Harris, E.C. Lefroy, S. Hugh, S.F. Gould, G. Lee, N.L. Bindoff & B. Mackey (2014). Improving the Use of Species Distribution Models in Conservation Planning and Management under Climate Change. PLoS ONE 9(11): e113749. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0113749 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0113749
R Core Team (2020). R: A language and environment for statistical computing. (Version 4.0.1). R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria.
Radosavljevic, A. & R.P. Anderson (2014). Making better Maxent models of species distributions: complexity, overfitting and evaluation. Journal of Biogeography 41(4): 629–643. https://doi.org/10.1111/jbi.12227 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/jbi.12227
Royer, A., S. Montuire, S. Legendre, E. Discamps, M. Jeannet & C. Lécuyer (2016). Investigating the Influence of Climate Changes on Rodent Communities at a Regional-Scale (MIS 1-3, Southwestern France). PLoS ONE 11(1): e0145600. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0145600 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0145600
Soberón, J. & B. Arroyo-Peña (2017). Are fundamental niches larger than the realized? Testing a 50-year-old prediction by Hutchinson. PLOS ONE 12(4): e0175138. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0175138 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0175138
Swart, N.C., J.N.S. Cole, V.V. Kharin, M. Lazare, J.F. Scinocca, N.P. Gillett, J. Anstey, V. Arora, J.R. Christian, Y. Jiao, W.G. Lee, F. Majaess, O.A. Saenko, C. Seiler, C. Seinen, A. Shao, L. Solheim, K. von Salzen, D. Yang, B. Winter & M. Sigmond (2019a). CCCma CanESM5 model output prepared for CMIP6 C4MIP esm-ssp585. Earth System Grid Federation. https://doi.org/10.22033/ESGF/CMIP6.10242
Swart, N.C., J.N.S. Cole, V.V. Kharin, M. Lazare, J.F. Scinocca, N.P. Gillett, J. Anstey, V. Arora, J.R. Christian, Y. Jiao, W.G. Lee, F. Majaess, O.A. Saenko, C. Seiler, C. Seinen, A. Shao, L. Solheim, K. von Salzen, D. Yang, B. Winter & M. Sigmond (2019b). CCCma CanESM5 model output prepared for CMIP6 DAMIP ssp245-GHG. Earth System Grid Federation. https://doi.org/10.22033/ESGF/CMIP6.3686
Szpunar, G., G. Aloise, S. Mazzotti, L. Nieder & M. Cristaldi (2008). Effects of global climate change on terrestrial small mammal communities in Italy. Fresenius Environmental Bulletin 17(9b): 1526–1533.
Tachiiri, K., M. Abe, T. Hajima, O. Arakawa, T. Suzuki, Y. Komuro, K. Ogochi, M. Watanabe, A. Yamamoto, H. Tatebe, M.A. Noguchi, R. Ohgaito, A. Ito, D. Yamazaki, A. Ito, K. Takata, S. Watanabe & M. Kawamiya (2019a). MIROC MIROC-ES2L model output prepared for CMIP6 ScenarioMIP ssp245. Earth System Grid Federation. https://doi.org/10.22033/ESGF/CMIP6.5745
Tachiiri, K., M. Abe, T. Hajima, O. Arakawa, T. Suzuki, Y. Komuro, K. Ogochi, M. Watanabe, A. Yamamoto, H. Tatebe, M.A. Noguchi, R. Ohgaito, A. Ito, D. Yamazaki, A. Ito, K. Takata, S. Watanabe & M. Kawamiya (2019b). MIROC MIROC-ES2L model output prepared for CMIP6 ScenarioMIP ssp585. Earth System Grid Federation. https://doi.org/10.22033/ESGF/CMIP6.5770
Takele, S., A. Bekele, G. Belay & M. Balakrishnan (2011). A comparison of rodent and insectivore communities between sugarcane plantation and natural habitat in Ethiopia. Tropical Ecology 52(1): 61–68.
Taylor, P.J., A. Nengovhela, J. Linden & R.M. Baxter (2016). Past, present, and future distribution of Afromontane rodents (Muridae: Otomys) reflect climate-change predicted biome changes. Mammalia 80(4): 359–375. https://doi.org/10.1515/mammalia-2015-0033 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/mammalia-2015-0033
Tilaye, W. (2005). Reproductive rhythm of the Grass Rat Arvicanthis abyssinicus at the Entoto Mountain, Ethiopia. Belgian Journal of Zoology 135: 53–56.
Urbina-Cardona, N., M.E. Blair, M.C. Londoño, R. Loyola, J. Velásquez-Tibatá & H. Morales-Devia (2019). Species Distribution Modeling in Latin America: A 25-Year Retrospective Review. Tropical Conservation Science 12: 194008291985405. https://doi.org/10.1177/1940082919854058 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1940082919854058
Yalden, D.W. & M.J. Largen (1992). The endemic mammals of Ethiopia. Mammal Review 22(3–4): 115–150. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2907.1992.tb00128.x DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2907.1992.tb00128.x
Zhang, Y., Z. Zhang & J. Liu (2003). Burrowing rodents as ecosystem engineers: the ecology and management of Plateau Zokors Myospalax fontanierii in alpine meadow ecosystems on the Tibetan Plateau. Mammal Review 33(3–4): 284–294. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-2907.2003.00020.x DOI: https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-2907.2003.00020.x