Anthropogenic climate and land-use change drive short- and long-term biodiversity shifts across taxa

Montràs-Janer, Teresa; Suggitt, Andrew J.; Fox, Richard; Jönsson, Mari; Martay, Blaise; Roy, David B. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5147-0331; Walker, Kevin J.; Auffret, Alistair G.. 2024 Anthropogenic climate and land-use change drive short- and long-term biodiversity shifts across taxa. Nature Ecology & Evolution, 8. 739-751. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-024-02326-7

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41559-024-02326-7

Abstract/Summary

Climate change and habitat loss present serious threats to nature. Yet, due to a lack of historical land-use data, the potential for land-use change and baseline land-use conditions to interact with a changing climate to affect biodiversity remains largely unknown. Here, we use historical land use, climate data and species observation data to investigate the patterns and causes of biodiversity change in Great Britain. We show that anthropogenic climate change and land conversion have broadly led to increased richness, biotic homogenization and warmer-adapted communities of British birds, butterflies and plants over the long term (50+ years) and short term (20 years). Biodiversity change was found to be largely determined by baseline environmental conditions of land use and climate, especially over shorter timescales, suggesting that biodiversity change in recent periods could reflect an inertia derived from past environmental changes. Climate–land-use interactions were mostly related to long-term change in species richness and beta diversity across taxa. Semi-natural grasslands (in a broad sense, including meadows, pastures, lowland and upland heathlands and open wetlands) were associated with lower rates of biodiversity change, while their contribution to national-level biodiversity doubled over the long term. Our findings highlight the need to protect and restore natural and semi-natural habitats, alongside a fuller consideration of individual species’ requirements beyond simple measures of species richness in biodiversity management and policy.

Item Type:	Publication - Article
Digital Object Identifier (DOI):	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-024-02326-7
UKCEH and CEH Sections/Science Areas:	Biodiversity (Science Area 2017-)
ISSN:	2397-334X
Additional Information. Not used in RCUK Gateway to Research.:	Open Access paper - full text available via Official URL link.
Additional Keywords:	biodiversity, climate-change ecology, conservation biology
NORA Subject Terms:	Ecology and Environment Meteorology and Climatology
Related URLs:	Dataset Dataset Dataset Dataset Other Other Other Dataset Dataset
Date made live:	16 Feb 2024 14:33 +0 (UTC)
URI:	https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/536920

Item Type:

Publication - Article

Digital Object Identifier (DOI):

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-024-02326-7

UKCEH and CEH Sections/Science Areas:

Biodiversity (Science Area 2017-)

ISSN:

2397-334X

Additional Information. Not used in RCUK Gateway to Research.:

Open Access paper - full text available via Official URL link.

Additional Keywords:

biodiversity, climate-change ecology, conservation biology