Mountain biodiversity: Response to Climate Change

Transcription

1 Mountain biodiversity: Response to Climate Change Christian Körner Global Mountain Biodiversity Assessment by DIVERSITAS Institute of Botany University of Basel, Switzerland COP 10 Nagoya, Japan, ICIMOD side event, 22. October 2010

2 Mountains are biodiversity hot spots Mountains cover 12 % of land surface, but contain ca. 1/3 of all plant species 17 of 34 global biodiversity hot spots are in mountain areas W Barthlott et al. (1999) <100 >5 000 Number of species per km 2

3 Why care for the diversity of organisms? Ethics Culture Ecology Economy All 4 are important, but each alone is important enough to care.

4 The ethical motive The right to exist The right to exist well

5 Cultural heritage Respect and historical treasure Cultural landscape - a fingerprint of society NW-Sechuan, China Tyrolian Alps

6 Ecological function Insurance (sustained ecosystem integrity) Biotic interactions (no organism is able to exist alone) Ecosystem functioning (productivity, nutrient and water relations)

7 Economic value Security of yield Quality of products Sustainable yield through genetic diversity

8 What is a mountain? GMBA defined by ruggedness, not meters a.s.l. A B C? >200 m for 9 x 30 pixels 1000 m 300 m Asia Europe Africa N-Am S-Am Aus Mio km 2

9 Globally Mio km 2 Bioclimatic belts in mountains 0.5 Nival 3.0 Snowline Alpine Uplands 12.5 Treeline >6.4 C, >94 d Montane Lowlands

10 The alpine and montane life zones occur worldwide Altitude (km) Scandinavia Tundra California Rocky Mts. Alps Himalayas Kilimanjaro Mexico Andes Atlas New Guinea Andes Australia New Zealand Tierra del Fuego North Equator South Ch Körner (2003) Alpine plant life. Springer, Berlin

11 Why care for mountains? Swiss Central Alps

12 ... last wilderness areas Cradle Mts. NP, Tasmania

13 Livelihood for millions... Langtang, 3650 m, Nepal

14 Places of myths, religion, culture

15 Water towers of mankind NW Sechuan, China 480 E 1460 P 980 R Evaporation Precipitation Runoff (mm) 270 Alps European lowland

16 Half of mankind depends on mountain water... NW-Sechuan, China

17 Mountain water for lowland use...

18 The area of influence is far greater Through river systems, half of the terrestrial surface is influenced. Through effects on regional climate most of the world is influenced.

19 Exceptionally high biodiversity greater than expected from area: The plant covered alpine land area is ca 3 %, but its contribution to angiosperm diversity is ca 4 %. Possibly, one third of global terrestrial biodiversity is in mountains, which is 2 to 3 times the expected, based on land area.

20 and it matters!

21 Biodiversity on slopes has a function Water balance Catchment yield Erosion risk

22 Do we need all those species?

23 Great Caucasus, 1500 m

24 A single species controls the edge

25 Mountain biodiversity secures catchments Catchment value depends on soil stability. Soil stability depends on a dense plant cover. A dense plant cover is secured by high plant species diversity.

26 Species optimum elevation (m) Plant species are migrating upwards - now! Number of species Species optimum elevation (m) Climatic warming affects W-European mountains + 65 m Magnitude of shift (m) J Lenoir et al (2008) Science 320:768

27 But there is habitat diversity!

28 Mountain biodiversity and climatic warming Don t trust meteorological data for the Alpine

29 Little habitat loss due to climatic warming because of topography Density of probability ( T) Lost (3 %) -3 cm soil temperature (270 data logger) Decrease (75 %) Current Future Increase (22 %) New Seasonal mean soil temperature ( C) D Scherrer & Ch Körner (2010)

30 Species responses to climatic warming Mountains may be refugia (2, 4) traps (3, 5) or a chance (6) The poor guys! 6 2 1

31 The most fragile systems

32 Adaptive management to climate change: Re-evaluate Mountain Protected Areas in face of global change Connect, and enlarge mountain areas and protect altitudinal and latitudinal gradients Protect key ecosystem features Reduce anthropogenic impact Identify refugia for key mountain biota Restore and relocate, when necessary J Baron et al. (2009) J Environ Management 44:1033

33 We urgently need a global network of LTER in mountains! Longterm ecological research» Make the invisible visible «by standardized monitoring. drivers (environment) responders (organisms) resulting ecosystem functions New tools for global comparisons

34 Geo-referenced biological databases Research Agenda : Mountains a laboratory for understanding basic questions of evolution: How is mountain biodiversity generated, evolved, assembled? Effective conservation of mountain biodiversity under global environmental change: assess effects of current efforts and future trends? Körner et al (2007) Mountain Res Developm 27:

35 in cooperation with GBIF Mountain Biodiversity Portal Christian Körner (GMBA chair, mountain def.) Eva Spehn (coordinator) Javier de la Torre and team, Vizzuality (web portal design and programming) Jens Paulsen (GIS mountain search criteria) Tim Robertson and GBIFS team (GBIF data handling) Falk Hüttmann (advisor, datamining, training) Dirk Nemitz (catalogue of mountain BD databases) Bernhard Dickoré (Himalayan Uplands Plant database)

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38 Get the data! GMBA-ICIMOD-GBIF workshop/ training on Open Access to Mountain Biodiversity Data of the Hindu Kush Himalayan region Kathmandu, Nepal 14 th -18 th June 2010

39 Human diversity and fitness for life in mountains is a key to sustainable landuse at high altitudes

40 Partners: Convention on Biological Diversity Programme of Work on Mountain Biodiversity: Keynote at SBSTTA 8 by Ch. Körner/GMBA Documents on Status and Trends of Mountain Biodiversity ( ) Review of the Implementation of the PoW ( )

41 Lots of good reasons to care!