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Microhabitats and canopy cover moderate high summer temperatures in a fragmented Mediterranean landscape
- Source :
- PLoS ONE, Vol 12, Iss 8, p e0183106 (2017), PLoS ONE
- Publication Year :
- 2017
- Publisher :
- Public Library of Science (PLoS), 2017.
-
Abstract
- This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.<br />Extreme heat events will become more frequent under anthropogenic climate change, especially in Mediterranean ecosystems. Microhabitats can considerably moderate (buffer) the effects of extreme weather events and hence facilitate the persistence of some components of the biodiversity. We investigate the microclimatic moderation provided by two important microhabitats (cavities formed by the leaves of the grass-tree Xanthorrhoea semiplana F.Muell., Xanthorrhoeaceae; and inside the leaf-litter) during the summer of 2015/16 on the Fleurieu Peninsula of South Australia. We placed microsensors inside and outside these microhabitats, as well as above the ground below the forest canopy. Grass-tree and leaf-litter microhabitats significantly buffered against high temperatures and low relative humidity, compared to ground-below-canopy sensors. There was no significant difference between grass-tree and leaf-litter temperatures: in both microhabitats, daily temperature variation was reduced, day temperatures were 1–5°C cooler, night temperatures were 0.5–3°C warmer, and maximum temperatures were up to 14.4°C lower, compared to ground-below-canopy sensors. Grass-tree and leaf-litter microhabitats moderated heat increase at an average rate of 0.24°C temperature per 1°C increase of ambient temperature in the ground-below-canopy microhabitat. The average daily variation in temperature was determined by the type (grass-tree and leaf-litter versus ground-below-canopy) of microhabitat (explaining 67%), the amount of canopy cover and the area of the vegetation fragment (together explaining almost 10% of the variation). Greater canopy cover increased the amount of microclimatic moderation provided, especially in the leaf-litter. Our study highlights the importance of microhabitats in moderating macroclimatic conditions. However, this moderating effect is currently not considered in species distribution modelling under anthropogenic climate change nor in the management of vegetation. This shortcoming will have to be addressed to obtain realistic forecasts of future species distributions and to achieve effective management of biodiversity.
- Subjects :
- 0106 biological sciences
Canopy
Mediterranean climate
summer temperatures
Atmospheric Science
Leaves
010504 meteorology & atmospheric sciences
Microclimate
lcsh:Medicine
Plant Science
Atmospheric sciences
01 natural sciences
Trees
anthropogenic climate change
lcsh:Science
Climatology
Multidisciplinary
biology
Geography
Ecology
Mediterranean Region
Plant Anatomy
Physics
Electromagnetic Radiation
Temperature
Vegetation
Biodiversity
Plants
Physical Sciences
Solar Radiation
Seasons
ecosystems
Research Article
heat wave
Climate Change
Summer
Climate change
010603 evolutionary biology
Meteorology
Grasses
Xanthorrhoea semiplana
Ecosystem
0105 earth and related environmental sciences
canopy
Tree canopy
Microhabitats
Extreme heat events
Ecology and Environmental Sciences
lcsh:R
Organisms
Humidity
Biology and Life Sciences
biology.organism_classification
Mediterranean ecosystems
Linear Models
Earth Sciences
Environmental science
lcsh:Q
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 19326203
- Volume :
- 12
- Issue :
- 8
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- PLoS ONE
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....1e0e155d483f2594cc4c9cdce75f1fc5