Modelling climate change-driven treeline shifts.pdfVIP

Journal of Blackwell Publishing, Ltd. Ecology 2004 Modelling climate change-driven treeline shifts: relative 92, 241–252 effects of temperature increase, dispersal and invasibility STEFAN DULLINGER, THOMAS DIRNBÖCK* and GEORG GRABHERR Institute of Ecology and Conservation Biology, University of Vienna, Althanstraße 14, A-1090 Vienna, Austria, and *Federal Environment Agency, Spittelauer Lände 5, A-1090 Vienna, Austria Summary 1 Global warming will probably shift treelines upslope in alpine areas and towards the pole in arctic environments. However, responses of regional treelines to climatic trends over the last century do not show any clear trends. We hypothesize that these equivocal responses may partly be caused by limitation of dispersal and/or recruitment that is species-specific to particular trees with potentially expanding ranges. 2 To test this hypothesis, we established and parameterized a temporally and spatially explicit model of plant spread and analysed its sensitivity to: (a) variation in predicted climatic trends; (b) the spatial distribution of recruits around a seed source; and (c) variation in the resistance of resident non-woody vegetation to invasion. We used data from a high mountain landscape of the Northern Calcareous Alps in Austria where the treeline is dominated by Pinus mugo Turra, a shrubby pine. 3 Low growth rates and long generation times, together with con