Abstract
Context: Besides climate change vulnerability, most ecosystems are under threat from a history of improper land-use and conservation policies, yet there is little existing long-term ecological research infrastructure in Turkey. In regions with no ecological networks across large landscapes, ecoregion concept offers opportunities for characterizing the landscape under changing climate. Objectives: Aim is to develop contemporary and future quantitative ecoregions for Turkey based on climate model outputs, to identify climate change-sensitive areas of biodiversity and conservation significance, and to provide a framework for a comprehensive ecological observatory network design. Methods: Using Multivariate Spatio-Temporal Clustering and climate data contemporary and projected future distributions of Turkey’s ecoregions are delineated at several division levels. Results: Turkey’s contemporary ecoregions generally show a northward shift by the end of this century and the lengthening of the growing season across the country, especially eastward and northward. The increase in growing season length, along with the shift in precipitation seasonality and increasing growing season precipitation, shape future conditions within the climate change-sensitive areas. Apart from transboundary ecological and socioeconomic significance, these potentially vulnerable ecosystems also constitute the majority of Turkey’s biodiversity hotspots. Conclusions: Our study marks the first ‘ecoregionalization’ study for Turkey based on both contemporary and future climate scenarios. For countries like Turkey, where large-scale ecological networks have not been established, using such quantitative methodology for delineation of optimal ecoclimatic regions, and for mapping environments at risk from climate change provides an invaluable perspective for conservation planning strategies, and a framework for a comprehensive ecological observatory network design.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 35-50 |
| Number of pages | 16 |
| Journal | Landscape Ecology |
| Volume | 34 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jan 15 2019 |
Funding
Data availability This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the U.S. Department of Energy. The United States Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the United States Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for United States Government purposes. The Department of Energy will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan (http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan). Acknowledgements We thank the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK), Turkey for funding this research. We acknowledge the Eurasia Institute of Earth Sciences of Istanbul Technical University for sharing the climate model data. We thank Climate Change Science Institute of Oak Ridge National Laboratory for hosting Yasemin Ergüner and for providing computing environments for this study during her postdoctoral research. This research was partially supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, U.S. Forest Service, and Eastern Forest Environmental Threat Assessment Center. We are grateful to Prof. Dr. Ömer Lütfü S¸ en, Prof. Dr. Meral Avcı and Prof. Dr. Sedat Avcı for their helpful comments and suggestions on the manuscript. We finally thank the editor and reviewers for their insightful comments and suggestions. We thank the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (T?B?TAK), Turkey for funding this research. We acknowledge the Eurasia Institute of Earth Sciences of Istanbul Technical University for sharing the climate model data. We thank Climate Change Science Institute of Oak Ridge National Laboratory for hosting Yasemin Erg?ner and for providing computing environments for this study during her postdoctoral research. This research was partially supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, U.S. Forest Service, and Eastern Forest Environmental Threat Assessment Center. We are grateful to Prof. Dr. ?mer L?tf? ?en, Prof. Dr. Meral Avc? and Prof. Dr. Sedat Avc? for their helpful comments and suggestions on the manuscript. We finally thank the editor and reviewers for their insightful comments and suggestions.
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| Eastern Forest Environmental Threat Assessment Center | |
| Eurasia Institute of Earth Sciences of Istanbul Technical University | |
| TÜBİTAK | |
| U.S. Department of Energy | |
| U.S. Department of Agriculture | |
| U.S. Forest Service | |
| Türkiye Bilimsel ve Teknolojik Araştirma Kurumu |
Keywords
- Biodiversity conservation
- Climate change
- Ecological observatory network
- Ecoregions
- Multivariate Spatio-Temporal Clustering
- Regional climate modelling
