Incomplete sampling restrict the use of databases for climate-change studies

TY - CONF

T1 - Incomplete sampling restrict the use of databases for climate-change studies

AU - Thyrring, Jakob

AU - Weslawski, Jan Marcin

AU - Sejr, Mikael Kristian

AU - Peck, Lloyd

AU - Harley, Christopher D. G.

PY - 2020/12

Y1 - 2020/12

N2 - Predictions of global biodiversity responses to environmental change require extensive biodiversity-databases to obtain sufficient high-resolution data on spatial patterns. Intertidal zones are signal environments for their global distributions, easy accessibility compared to other marine ecosystems, and value for identifying climate change impacts. However, owing to limited mapping of intertidal geographic areas, the extent to which intertidal records are available in biodiversity databases and how this extent may create certain future range shift predictions remain unknown. To assess this, we used novel high-resolution tidal flat area datasets to identify species records from a database between 60°S–60°N. We demonstrate that while richness peak at mid-latitudes, species absences peak near the equator. These patterns are correlated to disproportional mid-latitudinal sampling efforts, and a poor sampling coverage in tropical areas. Species with distributional gaps (that is a geographic gap in an otherwise continues distribution) in poorly sampled regions can cause uncertainty in range projections, biasing future range shift and extinction estimates, if such gaps are confirmed artefactual. Initiatives that promote more and better-distributed research effort to collect and mobilise biodiversity data from intertidal systems could help to improve predictions of climate change impacts at a truly global scale.

AB - Predictions of global biodiversity responses to environmental change require extensive biodiversity-databases to obtain sufficient high-resolution data on spatial patterns. Intertidal zones are signal environments for their global distributions, easy accessibility compared to other marine ecosystems, and value for identifying climate change impacts. However, owing to limited mapping of intertidal geographic areas, the extent to which intertidal records are available in biodiversity databases and how this extent may create certain future range shift predictions remain unknown. To assess this, we used novel high-resolution tidal flat area datasets to identify species records from a database between 60°S–60°N. We demonstrate that while richness peak at mid-latitudes, species absences peak near the equator. These patterns are correlated to disproportional mid-latitudinal sampling efforts, and a poor sampling coverage in tropical areas. Species with distributional gaps (that is a geographic gap in an otherwise continues distribution) in poorly sampled regions can cause uncertainty in range projections, biasing future range shift and extinction estimates, if such gaps are confirmed artefactual. Initiatives that promote more and better-distributed research effort to collect and mobilise biodiversity data from intertidal systems could help to improve predictions of climate change impacts at a truly global scale.

M3 - Poster

T2 - 5th World Conference on Marine Biodiversity

Y2 - 13 December 2020 through 16 December 2020

ER -