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Revisiting tree-migration rates: Abies alba (Mill.), a case study

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Abstract

At northern temperate latitudes trees have adjusted their ranges substantially in response to changing climates during the Holocene. Results from dispersal model simulations suggest that postglacial migration rates may have been over-estimated from fossil pollen data. As a contribution to this debate, we infer the migration rates of Abies alba (Mill.), silver fir, as a case-study species, by using a spatially explicit approach based on fossil pollen but taking into account its modern genetic diversity pattern. Maximum estimates of migration rates from fossil pollen data alone are higher than 700 m yr−1 during the Holocene. Considering the potential refugia as suggested from all the fossil data but restricting the area over which silver fir expanded from each glacial refugium using data on the current haplotype distribution, the estimated maximum migration rates of silver fir are less than 250 m yr−1. Genetic information may allow for (1) the exclusion of those refugial areas where the species may have survived during the last glacial period but from which it did not spread or spread only very locally and (2) the delineation of the areas over which the species spread from each glacial refugium. The estimated rates in the present study are generally consistent with rates suggested from modelling approaches. This study shows that integrating fossil pollen records can improve simulations of dispersal processes and, thus, allow for better predictions of future changes in tree species’ ranges.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by and is a contribution to the ECOCHANGE European project. PT is supported by Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia Grant SFRH/BD/42480/2007. The European Pollen Database contributors (http://www.europeanpollendatabase.net) are gratefully acknowledged for making their data-sets publicly available to the scientific community. The following free software was used in this publication: the R language with several libraries, the Generic Mapping Tools, QGIS, MySQL and phpmyadmin. HJBB acknowledges invaluable help from Cathy Jenks. The manuscript has been substantially improved by W. Tinner, by Th. Giesecke, and by two anonymous reviewers. This is an ISEM contribution number 2013-029.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institut des Sciences de l’Évolution, UMR UM2-CNRS-IRD 5554, University of Montpellier-2, Place Eugène-Bataillon, 34095, Montpellier Cedex 05, France

    Rachid Cheddadi, Pedro Tarroso & Henri Laborde

  2. Department of Biology and Bjerknes Centre for Climate Research, University of Bergen, PO Box 7803, 5020, Bergen, Norway

    H. John B. Birks

  3. Environmental Change Research Centre, University College London, Gower Street, London, WC1E 6BT, UK

    H. John B. Birks

  4. School of Geography and the Environment, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3QY, UK

    H. John B. Birks

  5. Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos, Universidade do Porto, Campus Agrário, 19 de Vairão, 4485-661, Vairão, Portugal

    Pedro Tarroso

  6. Conservation Biology, Faculty of Biology, Philipps-University Marburg, Karl-von-Frisch-Strasse 2, D21, 35032, Marburg, Germany

    Sascha Liepelt

  7. Faculty of Forestry, Technical University in Zvolen, T.G. Masaryka 24, 96053, Zvolen, Slovakia

    Dusan Gömöry

  8. Department of Conservation Biology Vegetation and Landscape Ecology, University of Vienna, Rennweg 14, 1030, Vienna, Austria

    Stefan Dullinger & Karl Hülber

  9. Vienna Institute for Nature Conservation and Analyses, Giessergasse 6/7, 1090, Vienna, Austria

    Stefan Dullinger & Karl Hülber

  10. Land Use Dynamics, Swiss Federal Research Institute WSL, Zuercherstrasse 111, 8903, Birmensdorf, Switzerland

    Eliane S. Meier

  11. Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Biophore Building, 1015, Lausanne, Switzerland

    Luigi Maiorano

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  1. Rachid Cheddadi
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  2. H. John B. Birks
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  10. Henri Laborde
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Correspondence to Rachid Cheddadi.

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Communicated by W. Tinner.

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Cheddadi, R., Birks, H.J.B., Tarroso, P. et al. Revisiting tree-migration rates: Abies alba (Mill.), a case study. Veget Hist Archaeobot 23, 113–122 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00334-013-0404-4

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