PCE - 15

Question 1

what is phenology?

Answer 1

the timing of seasonal activities of animals and plants - includes the timing of 1) arrival of migrants 2) appearance (butterflies , buds) 3) breeding

Question 2

how do we determine wether phenology has changed?

Answer 2

need to compare across decades of data
- natural historians (notes/collections)
- monitoring surveys
need to control for confounding variables

Question 3

what is bird laying date related too in the UK?

Answer 3

temperature or rainfall

Question 4

how has climate warming impacted phenology?

Answer 4

1) date of arrival and departure of migrants has been advanced by 8 days
2) first appearance is earlier and duration of appearance is longer
3) first breeding is happening earlier

Question 5

what are the benefits of this increase in climate temperature and change in timings?

Answer 5

• species can exploit favourable climates earlier in the year
• early access to best nest sites and abundant food - improved survival of young
• potential to make more breeding attempts

Question 6

what are the costs of the temperature change and change in timings of events?

Answer 6

• could be sudden bad weather causing death of adults or young
• phenology shifts in species but maybe not in its food

Question 7

what is the problem of warmer springs for oaks and moths?

Answer 7

timing of bud burst of oaks an egg hatching of moths is more mismatched

Question 8

how do you assess shifts in species distribution?

Answer 8

need to compare past distributions with current distributions - see if they’ve changes e.g. moved to higher latitudes

Question 9

what has been the effect of regional warming on the geographical ranges of non-migratory butterfly species?

Answer 9

35 species

• 65% have shifted northwards
• 3% shifted south

Question 10

how have increased temperatures affected moth species?

Answer 10

102 moth species moved to higher altitudes an average of 67m

Question 11

what is the problem with only focusing on poleward shifts of species?

Answer 11

would massively underestimate shifts in climate niches

Question 12

observed shifts of movement do not match expected shifts especially for elevation why might this be?

Answer 12

• species cant move quickly enough
• temperature grid cells in data predictions are too large
• species might operate on smaller scales

Question 13

what is a microhabitat?

Answer 13

fine scale (cm to m) features within a habitat

Question 14

when ambient temperature is warm, many microhabitats are cool why is this?

Answer 14

many microhabitats are thermal buffers - could possibly buffer some species against climate change

Question 15

when is thermal buffering seen on a great scale?

Answer 15

in the tropics

Question 16

what is an exmple of species exploiting microhabitats?

Answer 16

moving from ground to canopy up a tree can give the same affects as moving to other altitudes

• 2 degree change in temp from ground to canopy is the same as 400m elevation also = 2 degree
• moisture gradients are also steeper at tree scale than elevation scale