Impacts of landscape structure on butterfly range expansion

By Jane K. Hill, Yvonne C. Collingham, Christopher M Thomas, D. S. Blakeley, R. Fox, D. Moss, Brian Huntley. 2001

211 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Since the 1940s, the distributions of several butterfly species have been expanding in northern Europe, probably in response to climate warming. We focus on the speckled wood butterfly Pararge aegeria in order to determine impacts of habitat availability on expansion rates. We analyse observed expansion rates since 1940 and also use a spatially explicit mechanistic model (MIGRATE) to simulate range expansion in two areas of the UK which differ in their distribution of breeding habitat (woodland). Observed and simulated expansion rates were in very close agreement but were 42%–45% slower in an area that had 24% less woodland. Unlike P. aegeria, the majority of butterfly species are not currently expanding, almost certainly because of lack of suitable habitat. Incorporating the spatial distribution of habitat into investigations of range changes is likely to be important in determining those species that can and cannot expand, and for predicting potential future range changes.

Subfields: Ecological Modeling, Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics, Nature and Landscape Conservation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/268d1f43bf713c5d6960fa2ffa36a69b2587c162

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Citations in the corpus

The re-expansion and improving status of the silver-spotted skipper butterfly (Hesperia comma) in Britain: a metapopulation success story (2005, background): “To assist the movement of species through the wider countryside, mosaics of suitable habitat need to be managed (Roland et al., 2000; Ricketts, 2001; Hill et al., 2001; Sutcliffe et al., 2003), either by conservation agencies or under agri-environment schemes.”
Poleward shifts in breeding bird distributions in New York State (2009, background): “tive to biases in geography, turnover dynamics and effort (Brown et al., 1996; Lomolino & Channell, 1998; Channell & Lomolino, 2000; Hill et al., 2001; Shoo et al., 2005, 2006; La Sorte & Thompson, 2007).”
Assisted colonization in a changing climate: a test‐study using two U.K. butterflies (2009, background): “Climate change; distributions; introductions; range margin; range shift; assisted colonization.”
Multiple Dimensions of Climate Change and Their Implications for Biodiversity (2014, background): “(70) or unsuitable climate across time or space (71, 72), and can be stronger in lowland areas”
Long-term population trends in widespread British moths (2004, background): “Moreover, recent analyses have linked widespread changes in the distribution of birds and butterflies to patterns of global climate change (Parmesan et al. 1999; Thomas and Lennon 1999; Hill et al. 2001b; Parmesan 2001).”
Urbanization and homogenization – Comparing the floras of urban and rural areas in Germany (2006, methodology): “We chose a medium grain for our analysis, this was successful in answering many ecological questions about distribution pattern and environment with different focus and similar extent (countries of comparable size) than this analysis (Heikkinen et al., 1998; Roy et al., 1999; Lennon et al., 2000, 20”
Potential impacts of climatic change upon geographical distributions of birds (2006, unknown): “1996, Collingham & Huntley 2000, Hill et al .”
Including species interactions in risk assessments for global change (2007, background): “Habitats are the templets on which ecological strategies develop (Southwood, 1977; Hill et al., 2001).”
Expanding northward: influence of climate change, forest connectivity, and population processes on a threatened species' range shift (2011, methodology): “Hill et al. (2001) showed that expansion rates of the speckled wood butterfly (Pararge aegeria) were faster in areas with higher habitat amounts, measured as the percent cover of habitat within 5 km grid squares.”
Incorporating landscape elements into a connectivity measure: a case study for the Speckled wood butterfly (Pararge aegeria L.) (2003, background): “We chose this species because it prefers woody landuse elements tree rows, hedgerows when moving through the matrix Hill et al. 2001; H. Van Dyck, personal communication; J.P.”
Increasing range mismatching of interacting species under global change is related to their ecological characteristics (2012, background): “In particular, land use may significantly affect future species range changes (Hill et al., 2001), and should be taken into account alongside climatic changes (Pompe et al.”
Modelling and analysing evolution of dispersal in populations at expanding range boundaries (2007, background): “It was assumed that individuals are able to detect suitable habitat nearby (e.g. Hill et al. , 2001; Conradt et al. , 2003 ) and so individuals that arrive in a cell with no habitat move into an adjacent cell with habitat if there is one, or die.”
Herbivory and climatic warming: a Mediterranean outbreaking caterpillar attacks a relict, boreal pine species (2004, background): “However, the outcome of this plant–herbivore emerging interaction is mediated by the structure of the habitat where the interaction takes place (Masutti and Battisti 1990; Watt 1992; Hill et al. 1999, 2001).”
Recent trends in butterfly populations from north-east Spain and Andorra in the light of habitat and climate change (2011, background): “However, at the northern margins the extent to which range expansions occur also depends on other factors such as landscape structure (Hill et al. 2001; Menéndez et al. 2006).”
Rapid responses of British butterflies to opposing forces of climate and habitat change (2001, background): “jpg" NDATA ITEM> ]> Habitat degradation and climate change are thought to be altering the distributions and abundances of animals and plants throughout the world, but their combined impacts have not been assessed for any species assemblag”
Geographical range margins of many taxonomic groups continue to shift polewards (2015, unknown): “Species may vary in their sensitivity to different aspects of climate, and responses of species may also reﬂect the amount of warming, as well as habitat availability (Hill et al. , 2001), which may contribute to these differences among taxa.”