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Climate change has intensified the effects of habitat fragmentation in many ecosystems, particularly exacerbated in riparian habitats. Therefore, there is an urgent need to identify keystone connectivity spots to ensure long-term conservation and sustainable management of riparian systems as they play a crucial role for landscape connectivity. This paper aims to identify critical areas for connectivity under two contrasting climate change scenarios (RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5 models) for the years 2030, 2050 and 2100 and to group these critical areas by similar connectivity in keystone spots for sustainable management. A set of analyses comprising climate analysis, drainage network analysis, configuration of potential riparian habitats, riparian habitat connectivity, data clustering, and statistical analysis within a Spanish river basin (NW Spain) were applied. The node and link connectivity would be reduced under the two climate change scenarios (≈2.5 % and 4.4 % reduction, respectively), intensifying riparian habitat fragmentation. Furthermore, 51 different clusters (critical areas) were obtained and classified in five classes (keystone spots) with similar connectivity across the different scenarios of climate change. Each keystone spot obtained by hierarchical classification was associated with one or more climate scenarios. One of these keystone spots was especially susceptible to the worst climate change scenario. Key riparian connectivity spots will be crucial for the management and restoration of highly threatened riparian systems and to ensure long-term biodiversity conservation. • Connectivity importance was reduced under different climate change scenarios. • Critical area detection for connectivity conservation is threatened by climate change. • Critical areas were classified with similar connectivity keystone spots against climate change. • Keystone spots with high PC index will be priority for conservation management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) is a well-established eco-hydrological model that has been extensively applied to watersheds across the globe. This work reviews over two decades (2002–2022) of SWAT studies conducted on Mediterranean watersheds. A total of 260 articles have been identified since the earliest documented use of the model in a Mediterranean catchment back in 2002; of which 62% were carried out in Greece, Italy, or Spain. SWAT applications increased significantly in recent years since 86% of the reviewed papers were published in the past decade. A major objective for most of the reviewed works was to check the applicability of SWAT to specific watersheds. A great number of publications included procedures of calibration and validation and reported performance results. SWAT applications in the Mediterranean region mainly cover water resources quantity and quality assessment and hydrologic and environmental impacts evaluation of land use and climate changes. Nevertheless, a tendency towards a multi-purpose use of SWAT is revealed. The numerous examples of SWAT combined with other tools and techniques outline the model's flexibility. Several studies performed constructive comparisons between Mediterranean watersheds' responses or compared SWAT to other models or methods. The effects of inputs on SWAT outputs and innovative model modifications and improvements were also the focus of some of the surveyed articles. However, a significant number of studies reported difficulties regarding data availability, as these are either scarce, have poor resolution or are not freely available. Therefore, it is highly recommended to identify and develop accurate model inputs and testing data to optimize the SWAT performance. [Display omitted] • SWAT review on Mediterranean hydro-climatic studies. • Lack of SWAT assessment on Mediterranean catchments. • A comparison of data from different Mediterranean basins. • Enhancing data availability for SWAT applications. • Developing a comprehensive knowledge of Mediterranean watersheds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]