Global endemics-area relationships of vascular plants

Hobohm, Carsten; Janišová, Monika; Steinbauer, Manuel; Landi, Sara; Field, Richard; Vanderplank, Sula; Beierkuhnlein, Carl; Grytnes, John-Arvid; Vetaas, Ole Reidar; Fidelis, Alessandra; de Nascimento, Lea; Clark, Vincent Ralph; Fernández-Palacios, José María; Franklin, Scott; Guarino, Riccardo; Huang, Jihong; Krestov, Pavel; Ma, Keping; Onipchenko, Vladimir; Palmer, Mike W.; Simon, Marcelo Fragomeni; Stolz, Christian; Chiarucci, Alessandro

Abstract

Endemics–Area Relationships (EARs) are fundamental in theoretical and applied biogeography for understanding distribution patterns and promoting biodiversity conservation. However, calculating EARs for vascular plant species from existing data is problematic because of biased knowledge of endemic species distributions and differences between taxonomies. We aimed to overcome these challenges by developing a new standardized global dataset based on expert knowledge to produce a set of global EARs.

We developed a nested circle design, with grain sizes of 10^4, 10^5, 10^6, 10^7, and 10^8 km2, respectively, and a global distribution of plots based on a stratified random scheme. The number of vascular plant species endemic to each circle was then estimated independently by five experts randomly chosen from a pool of 23, as both a minimum and a maximum value (lower and upper bounds of the estimation), taking into account the limitations of current knowledge and varied species concepts in existing taxonomies. This procedure resulted in a dataset of 3000 expert estimates.

Based on the data, we produced three global EARs for endemic species richness using minimum, maximum and average estimates. As a validation, we used all three models to extrapolate to the entire world, producing estimates of 284,493 (minimum), 398,364 (maximum) and 312,243 (average) vascular plant species. These figures conform to the range of taxonomists’ estimates. From the models, we calculated the average area needed to harbour a single endemic species as 12,875 km2 (range 9675–20,529).

Citation

Hobohm, C., Janišová, M., Steinbauer, M., Landi, S., Field, R., Vanderplank, S., …Chiarucci, A. (2019). Global endemics-area relationships of vascular plants. Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation, 17(2), 41-49. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pecon.2019.04.002

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Apr 19, 2019
• Online Publication Date: Apr 30, 2019
• Publication Date: Apr 30, 2019
• Deposit Date: Aug 27, 2019
• Publicly Available Date: Aug 28, 2019
• Journal: Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation
• Print ISSN: 2530-0644
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 17
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 41-49
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pecon.2019.04.002
• Keywords: Expert knowledge, Minimum and maximum estimates, Zero-endemic plots, Distribution of land and sea, Global reference
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1876327
• Publisher URL: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2530064419300173?via%3Dihub