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The European Butterfly Climate Change Indicator

The European Butterfly Climate Change Indicator. Chris van Swaay, De Vlinderstichting / Dutch Butterfly Conservation Butterfly Conservation Europe. To a European Butterfly  Climate Change Indicator. To a European Butterfly Climate change Indicator.

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The European Butterfly Climate Change Indicator

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  1. The European Butterfly Climate Change Indicator Chris van Swaay, De Vlinderstichting / Dutch Butterfly Conservation Butterfly Conservation Europe

  2. To a European Butterfly Climate Change Indicator • To • a European • Butterfly • Climate change • Indicator

  3. To a European Butterfly Climate Change Indicator • 1976: start of the first Butterfly MonitoringScheme in the UK • Now at least 2000 transects in 14 countries • Every year our European volunteers count once around the world (40.000 km)!

  4. Butterfly MonitoringSpatial coverage • New countries join in every year • Most of them done on a routine basis

  5. Butterfly MonitoringTemporal coverage

  6. To a European Butterfly Climate Change Indicator Range expansion of Polygonia c-album in the Netherlands between 1975 and 2000 (Milieu- en Natuurplanbureau, 2003).

  7. Polygonia c-album expansionin the UK

  8. Six (out of fifteen) examples of range expansion of butterfly species in the United Kingdom and Ireland (Fox et al., 2006).

  9. Letters to Nature in 1999 and 2001

  10. Climatic Atlas of European Butterflies • Climate change poses a considerable additional risk to European butterflies • Under the extreme, no dispersal GRAS scenario until 2080, 74% of the modelled species lose more than 50% of their present climatic niche • butterflies are sensitive for climate change

  11. To a European ButterflyClimate Change Indicator Some of the criteria for indicators: • Policy relevance • Broad acceptance • Sensitive • Scientific sound method • Affordable monitoring, available and routinely collected data • Spatial and temporal coverage of data • Measure progress towards target

  12. How climate change may affect butterflies • Direct effects on the physiology • Indirect effects as microclimatic cooling • Effects on the abiotic environment • Impact on the vegetation structure • Change of range of larval foodplants • Species interactions

  13. Tested methods • Climate positive and negative speciesComparable to the breeding bird climate change indicator (Richard Gregory), distinguishing climate positive and negative species. • Shift of species over their European RangeRange change in northern direction leads to a increase in the north and a decrease in the south. • Changes in Community Temperature Index per countryMeasure changes in community composition in response to climate warming. • Changes in Community Temperature Index in Europe Four Butterfly Monitoring Schemes used: Finland, UK, Netherlands and Catalunya.

  14. Method 1: Number of climate positive and negative species Species are considered climate neutral if their expected change in Settele et al. (2008) under the full dispersal BAMBU scenario in 2080 is less than 20%.

  15. Composite indexes

  16. Method 2: species shift • Composite index for Finland and Catalunya of the 17 species occurring in both Butterfly Monitoring Schemes.

  17. Method 3: Community Temperature Index per country • We expect species to move north • As a result species composition will change • More ‘warm’ species, less ‘cool’ species • Method developed by Devictor et al. (2008) for birds in France

  18. Warm and cool species • Species Temperature Index (STI) is the long-term average temperature experienced by individuals of that species over its range.

  19. A cool species:Plebejus optilete STI=4.2oC Source: Kudrna 2002

  20. A warm species:Hipparchia fidia STI=13.5oC Source: Kudrna 2002

  21. Community Temperature Index CTI • Average of each individual’s STI on a transect • A high CTI would thus reflect a large proportion of warm species with a high STI, i.e. more high temperature dwelling species. • A rising CTI means • warm species are increasing and/or • cool species declining

  22. Change in CTI per BMS

  23. Method 4: Community Temperature Index per country • An unweighted analysis was initially performed but is biased by the large number of transects in the United Kingdom and Netherlands relatively to the other two schemes. • The CTI scores per country are weighted by the area per country.

  24. Weighted CTI for Finland, UK,NL and Catalunya

  25. Butterfly Climate Indicator • Since 1990 CTI changed 0.0142 ± 0,0017 oC per year (P<0.001) in the four countries • As a comparison: in the Netherlands the temperature has risen with 0,0389oC per year from 1970-2007 • Devictor et al. (2008) reported a shift of 0,0060 ± 0,0007 oC per year (P<0.001) for birds in France

  26. Butterfly Climate ChangeIndicator • The annual change of CTI is a good candidate to build a European Butterfly Climate Change Indicator • It could be extended to all European Butterfly Monitoring Schemes • Comparisons with bird and other indicator groups would be most interesting

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