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![Savanna encroachment: (a) grasslands in South Africa have high species richness and play important roles in water production. (b) As a result of climatic changes, the altitudinal limit of savannas is increasing and they are spreading into South African grasslands. Consequently, grasslands are one of the most threatened biomes in South Africa (both images courtesy of T Hoffman and copyright of the Plant Conservation Unit [UCT] under a CC BY‐NC 4.0 Creative Commons license). Glacial melt: (c) glaciers and mountain snowpack are important for recreation, agriculture, and hydropower, as well as ecological function. (d) As glaciers retreat and mountain snowpack is lost, implications can be substantial for loss of these important services. For example, the meltwater stonefly (Lednia tumana) has been listed under the US Endangered Species Act as one ecological consequence of glacier melt.
A du Toit; CC BY‐NC 4.0 (1922)
J Puttick; CC BY‐NC 4.0 (2011)
G Grant/Glacier NP Archives (Boulder Glacier 1932)
J DeSanto/K Ross Toole Archives, U Montana (Boulder Glacier 1988)](publication/353107617/figure/fig2/AS:11431281245131763@1716059820301/Savanna-encroachment-a-grasslands-in-South-Africa-have-high-species-richness-and-play.png)
Savanna encroachment: (a) grasslands in South Africa have high species richness and play important roles in water production. (b) As a result of climatic changes, the altitudinal limit of savannas is increasing and they are spreading into South African grasslands. Consequently, grasslands are one of the most threatened biomes in South Africa (both images courtesy of T Hoffman and copyright of the Plant Conservation Unit [UCT] under a CC BY‐NC 4.0 Creative Commons license). Glacial melt: (c) glaciers and mountain snowpack are important for recreation, agriculture, and hydropower, as well as ecological function. (d) As glaciers retreat and mountain snowpack is lost, implications can be substantial for loss of these important services. For example, the meltwater stonefly (Lednia tumana) has been listed under the US Endangered Species Act as one ecological consequence of glacier melt. A du Toit; CC BY‐NC 4.0 (1922) J Puttick; CC BY‐NC 4.0 (2011) G Grant/Glacier NP Archives (Boulder Glacier 1932) J DeSanto/K Ross Toole Archives, U Montana (Boulder Glacier 1988)
Source publication
Ecosystem transformation involves the emergence of persistent ecological or social–ecological systems that diverge, dramatically and irreversibly, from prior ecosystem structure and function. Such transformations are occurring at increasing rates across the planet in response to changes in climate, land use, and other factors. Consequently, a dynam...
Citations
... Management of refugia is often characterized as a "resistance" approach in the resist-accept-direct (Schuurman et al., 2020;Lynch et al., 2021) and the resistance-resilience-transformation frameworks (RRT; St-Laurent et al., 2021), because its intent is to preserve the existing characteristics of the ecosystem through protection (Morelli and Millar, 2018) in-situ. However, it may also be considered resilience in the RRT framework if there is re-introduction of species and habitat restoration, and transformation if it includes assisted range expansion from other areas into the refugium (Balantic et al., 2021), creating ex-situ refugia (Ashcroft, 2010). ...
In the face of climate change and associated increases in disturbances, some areas, known as refugia, will remain or become newly habitable for species, while others will be lost. Planning and managing for refugia can support biodiversity and conservation. However, without explicit consideration of justice, planning and management for refugia risks unnecessarily limiting information about local conditions and traditional practices that may be contained in Indigenous knowledges, and causing maladaptive consequences such as exclusion of Indigenous communities from decision-making and from protected areas, with loss of use of traditional plants and animals. The article proposes a new concept, Indigenous refugia, that incorporates three types of justice into existing theories of refugia for conservation in the face of climate change: recognition justice as understanding and respect for Indigenous values, experiences, and knowledges; procedural justice in collaboration and decision-making; and distributional justice as access to species and lands that sustain cultural and social processes. It presents a potential example of Indigenous refugia for the planning and management for climate-vulnerable Douglas-fir in New Mexico in collaboration with Pueblo, Diné (Navajo), Nde (Apache), and other Indigenous peoples with ancestral lands in the area.
... The stewardship of novel mixed-species landscapes of the future will be conditioned by their biodiversity and ecosystem characteristics, how these are aligned to societal values, and the feasibility of potential interventions. Here, McGeoch et al. [42] propose that the so-called RAD (resist-accept-direct) framework [47] can be used to guide a more nuanced decision-making under this emerging novelty. Notably, direct (D) approaches accommodate alien species that have neutral or socially desirable ecological effects but include interventions to 'direct' communities towards more desirable, resilient and biodiverse states, while accept (A) approaches 'accept' alien-species-caused ecosystem transformations while adapting to reduce any negative impacts. ...
... The inherent uncertainties surrounding ongoing environmental changes and their ecological consequences underscore the challenges of predicting their full range of impacts and the design of appropriate responses. This highlights the need for a proactive and flexible approach to ecosystem management and conservation planning [40,47] in the face of the accelerating emergence of novel biosphere conditions. ...
... Notably, ecosystem stewardship can only be achieved with people, rather than without or against people. The RAD framework [47] provides a valuable tool for decision-making, allowing us to direct climate-and globalization-induced dynamics towards desirable ecological effects and adapt to transformations while minimizing negative impacts, as discussed here in the context of biological invasions [42]. Yet, vitally, its implementation will have to vary according to cultural and political context. ...
Human-induced global changes, including anthropogenic climate change, biotic globalization, trophic downgrading and pervasive land-use intensification, are transforming Earth's biosphere, placing biodiversity and ecosystems at the forefront of unprecedented challenges. The Anthropocene, characterized by the importance of Homo sapiens in shaping the Earth system, necessitates a re-evaluation of our understanding and stewardship of ecosystems. This theme issue delves into the multifaceted challenges posed by the ongoing ecological planetary transformation and explores potential solutions across four key subthemes. Firstly, it investigates the functioning and stewardship of emerging novel ecosystems, emphasizing the urgent need to comprehend the dynamics of ecosystems under uncharted conditions. The second subtheme focuses on biodiversity projections under global change, recognizing the necessity of predicting ecological shifts in the Anthropocene. Importantly, the inherent uncertainties and the complexity of ecological responses to environmental stressors pose challenges for societal responses and for accurate projections of ecological change. The RAD framework (resist-accept-direct) is highlighted as a flexible yet nuanced decision-making tool that recognizes the need for adaptive approaches, providing insights for directing and adapting to Anthropocene dynamics while minimizing negative impacts. The imperative to extend our temporal perspective beyond 2100 is emphasized, given the irreversible changes already set in motion. Advancing methods to study ecosystem dynamics under rising biosphere novelty is the subject of the third subtheme. The fourth subtheme emphasizes the importance of integrating human perspectives into understanding, forecasting and managing novel ecosystems. Cultural diversity and biological diversity are intertwined, and the evolving relationship between humans and ecosystems offers lessons for future stewardship. Achieving planetary stewardship in the Anthropocene demands collaboration across scales and integration of ecological and societal perspectives, scalable approaches fit to changing, novel ecological conditions, as well as cultural innovation.
This article is part of the theme issue ‘Ecological novelty and planetary stewardship: biodiversity dynamics in a transforming biosphere’.
... More recently, conservation practitioners have begun shifting management beyond resisting changes and retaining existing (or baseline) ecological conditions to also facilitating what many now see as inevitable ecosystem transformations (eg forests to savannas). The resist-accept-direct (RAD) framework is a decisionsupport tool for identifying management approaches that resist changes to ecosystems, accept changes when they may be tolerable or even desirable, or direct changes to something different than the past to maintain ecosystem structure, function, or services (Lynch et al. 2021;Schuurman et al. 2022). Although directing ecosystems may become increasingly necessary in transforming environments, unanticipated epizootics may emerge as a consequence of a practitioner's actions. ...
Climate change is a well‐documented driver and threat multiplier of infectious disease in wildlife populations. However, wildlife disease management and climate‐change adaptation have largely operated in isolation. To improve conservation outcomes, we consider the role of climate adaptation in initiating or exacerbating the transmission and spread of wildlife disease and the deleterious effects thereof, as illustrated through several case studies. We offer insights into best practices for disease‐smart adaptation, including a checklist of key factors for assessing disease risks early in the climate adaptation process. By assessing risk, incorporating uncertainty, planning for change, and monitoring outcomes, natural resource managers and conservation practitioners can better prepare for and respond to wildlife disease threats in a changing climate.
... We use the resist-accept-direct (RAD; Lynch et al., 2021Lynch et al., , 2022 framework to define actions related to restoration given the distance from threshold and capacity for restoration. In our example prioritization structure, we would accept that units with low capacity may move across the threshold given forcing actions on the riverscape. ...
... We categorized which management action could be taken within a riverscape unit based on the resist-accept-direct (RAD) framework (Lynch et al., 2021(Lynch et al., , 2022Box 4). The RAD framework was created to allow for prioritization of management actions on the landscape and empowers managers to use techniques within adaptive management in relation to ecosystem change (Lynch et al., 2022). ...
... Summarizing to the subwatershed can provide expectation regarding the amount and type of intervention expected. However, if only provided the subwatershed summary, riverscape F I G U R E 4 Resulting prioritization structure within valley bottom unit (a-c), summarized using most units within a resist-accept-direct (RAD; Lynch et al., 2021Lynch et al., , 2022 pathway at the 12-digit HUC level (d-f) for the sections of the Upper Humboldt (a, d), Reese (b, e), and West Walker (c, f) subbasins of Nevada and California, United States of America. The prioritization is guided by inputs of normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and proportion of the valley bottom lowest lying areas (LL) in relation to a status threshold (x-axis), and the capacity for restoration, where we are using the valley bottom area as an example restoration metric (y-axis). ...
Prioritizing restoration opportunities effectively across entire riverscape networks (i.e., riverine landscape including floodplain and stream channel networks) can be difficult when relying on in‐channel, reach‐scale monitoring data, or watershed‐level summaries that fail to capture riverscape heterogeneity and the information necessary to implement restoration actions. Leveraging remote sensing and geospatial tools to develop spatially continuous information across nested hierarchical scales may support increased understanding of local riverscape reaches in their broader network context. Using riparian (vegetation) and geomorphic (elevation) indicators to assess status of riverscape health, along with a measure of restoration capacity (valley bottom area), could be adapted to fit specific management goals related to riverscape restoration. Frameworks using remotely sensed vegetation and elevation data to prioritize restoration continuously across riverscapes at restoration‐relevant, reach‐scales may uphold the ecosystem services provided by riverscapes. By incorporating local knowledge and identifying caveats for using these datasets, continuous inferences can be applied at network scales (watershed to regional extent and reach‐scale resolution) to prioritize restoration over a wide variety of ecoregions.
This article is categorized under: Water and Life > Conservation, Management, and Awareness
Water and Life > Methods
Water and Life > Stresses and Pressures on Ecosystems
... Climate change is modifying forest ecosystems' distribution and productivity as well as their mitigation potential (McDowell et al. 2020). Yet there is a great uncertainty in the quantification of climatic risks for most forest ecosystems (Purves and Pacala 2008;Anderegg et al. 2022), and our understanding of how different adaptation options influence resilience is still very limited for most forest-types (Lindner et al. 2014;Lynch et al. 2021). Temperate dry forests are highly exposed to an increase in temperatures and aridity, with longer and more intense droughts that can jeopardize key ecosystem services (Carnicer et al. 2011;Clark et al. 2016;Senf et al. 2020;Socha et al. 2023). ...
Context
Mediterranean managed dry-edge pine forests maintain biodiversity and supply key ecosystem services but are threatened by climate change and are highly vulnerable to desertification. Forest management through its effect on stand structure can play a key role on forest stability in response to increasing aridity, but the role of forest structure on drought resilience remains little explored.
Objectives
To investigate the role of tree growth and forest structure on forest resilience under increasing aridity and two contrasting policy-management regimes. We compared three management scenarios; (i) “business as usual”-based on the current harvesting regime and increasing aridity—and two scenarios that differ in the target forest function; (ii) a “conservation scenario”, oriented to preserve forest stock under increasing aridity; and (iii), a “productivity scenario” oriented to maintain forest yield under increasingly arid conditions.
Methods
The study site is part of a large-homogeneous pine-covered landscape covering sandy flatlands in Central Spain. The site is a dry-edge forest characterized by a lower productivity and tree density relative to most Iberian Pinus pinaster forests. We parameterized and tested an analytical size-structured forest dynamics model with last century tree growth and forest structure historical management records.
Results
Under current management (Scenario-i), increasing aridity resulted in a reduction of stock, productivity, and maximum mean tree size. Resilience boundaries differed among Scenario-ii and -Scenario-iii, revealing a strong control of the management regime on resilience via forest structure. We identified a trade-off between tree harvest size and harvesting rate, along which there were various possible resilient forest structures and management regimes. Resilience boundaries for a yield-oriented management (Scenario-iii) were much more restrictive than for a stock-oriented management (Scenario-ii), requiring a drastic decrease in both tree harvest size and thinning rates. In contrast, stock preservation was feasible under moderate thinning rates and a moderate reduction in tree harvest size.
Conclusions
Forest structure is a key component of forest resilience to drought. Adequate forest management can play a key role in reducing forest vulnerability while ensuring a long-term sustainable resource supply. Analytical tractable models of forest dynamics can help to identify key mechanisms underlying drought resilience and to design management options that preclude these social-ecological systems from crossing a tipping point over a degraded alternate state.
... Few studies test this systematically. A survey of the lay public and ecologists elicited opinions on the risks to ecosystems posed by climate change and other stressors, including habitat alteration, fragmentation, and pollution (Lazo et al., 2000). The authors found ecologists perceived climate change as less avoidable, a lower risk to ecosystems and more acceptable than potential impacts from other stressors. ...
... The survey also explored views about current and future conditions, as climate change impacts intensify and more information is known. This is a response to previous research suggesting ecologists may be more supportive of 'cautiously aggressive' policy that addresses immediate threats while more data is collected on future threats (Bandura, 2000;Lazo et al., 2000). ...
... Although participants in this study were somewhat hesitant to move native species and deliberately manage novel ecosystems, non-native species, and anthropocentric values, our research suggests ecologists may be more supportive of new approaches when they are approached with caution, i.e., complemented with additional research to reduce uncertainties. This is not out of step with other research that suggests experts may be more likely to support management actions which have been evaluated scientifically (Lazo et al., 2000;MacDonald et al., 2015). Indeed, a recurring theme in the responses to the survey was that experts were aware of the need to change, but had some reservations about what that means in practice. ...
... Globally, land management agencies, conservation organizations, and indigenous communities recognize these climate-induced shifts on ecosystems within their jurisdictional properties yet struggle to develop informed responses. Few options exist, broadly categorized as resisting, accepting, or directing (i.e., facilitating) climate induced changes 7,8 . Given the shortfalls in understanding relationships between climate change and ecosystems, and the lack of maps predicting future ecosystem distributions at relevant scales, resisting or accepting climate change become default approaches. ...
... Land-management agencies experience ecosystem shifts and compositional transformations occurring throughout their jurisdictions, and recognize the range of response options available, like resisting (i.e., forest thinning to reduce soil moisture demand and tree canopy fuels), accepting, or directing climate induced changes (e.g., species relocations outside historical ranges; seeding burned areas with a mixture of historical and transitional species) 7,8 . These agencies want deliberative mitigation strategies, but lack foundational data describing the relationships between climate change and ecosystems, along with maps predicting ecosystem suitability in future periods, at scales relevant for informing them. ...
Climate change shifts ecosystems, altering their compositions and instigating transitions, making climate change the predominant driver of ecosystem instability. Land management agencies experience these climatic effects on ecosystems they administer yet lack applied information to inform mitigation. We address this gap, explaining ecosystem shifts by building relationships between the historical locations of 22 ecosystems (c. 2000) and abiotic data (1970 – 2000; bioclimate, terrain) within the southwestern United States using ‘ensemble’ machine learning models. These relationships identify the conditions required for establishing and maintaining southwestern ecosystems (i.e., ecosystem suitability). We projected these historical relationships to mid (2041-2060) and end-of-century (2081-2100) periods using CMIP6 generation BCC-CSM2-MR and GFDL-ESM4 climate models with SSP3-7.0 and SSP5-8.5 emission scenarios. This procedure reveals how ecosystems shift, as suitability typically increases in area (~50% (~40% SD)), elevation (12-15%) and northing (4-6%) by mid-century. We illustrate where and when ecosystems shift, by mapping suitability predictions temporally and within 52,565 properties (e.g., Federal, State, Tribal). All properties had >50% changes in suitability for >1 ecosystem within them, irrespective of size (>16.7 km2). We integrated 9 climate models to quantify predictive uncertainty and exemplify its relevance. Agencies must manage ecosystem shifts transcending jurisdictions. Effective mitigation requires collective action heretofore rarely instituted. Our procedure supplies the climatic context to inform their decisions.
... While the future state of many ecosystems is unknown, substantial effort is directed toward modelling potential future ecosystems and our omission of key biophysical factors governing future fire limit the utility of these endeavours. Land managers are increasingly adopting frameworks that allow for considered judgements regarding future ecosystem state as forests reorganise under climate warming; for example, the resist-accept-direct (RAD) framework or structure decision making (SDM; Gazzard et al., 2019;Lynch et al., 2021;Schwilch et al., 2012). Ensuring that models of fire activity in vegetated systems fully represent the mechanisms driving fire activity will facilitate better decision-making and trade-offs by land managers. ...
The distributions of vegetation and fire activity are changing rapidly in response to climate warming. In many regions, climate effects on dead fuel moisture content (FMC) are expected to increase future wildfire activity. However, forest FMC is largely driven by microclimate conditions, which are moderated from open weather by vegetation canopies. As shifts in vegetation increase under climate warming, the extent to which future fire activity will be driven by climate directly or associated vegetation shifts remains unresolved. Here, we present a study aimed at quantifying the relative magnitudes of (i) direct climate warming, and (ii) vegetation change, on FMC. Field sites to evaluate these effects were established in a natural laboratory of altered forest states to mature wet temperate forest in south‐eastern Australia. FMC was estimated using a process‐based model and 48 years of reconstructed climate data. Canopy effects on microclimate were captured by transferring inputs from climate to microclimate using models parameterised with field observations. To evaluate the relative magnitude of climate and vegetation effects, we calculated the maximum difference in mean annual FMC across annual climate replicates and compared this to FMC differences across reorganising forest sites. Our results show vegetation effects on FMC can exceed those related to expected climate change. Changes to forest structure and composition increased (+15.7%) and decreased (−12.3%) mean annual FMC, with a larger negative effect when forest cover was completely removed (−18.5%). In contrast, the largest climate effect on FMC was −6.6% across 48‐years of data. Our study demonstrates that the magnitude of vegetation effects on FMC can exceed expected climate change effects. Models of future fire activity that do not account for changing vegetation effects on microclimate are omitting a key biophysical control on FMC and therefore may not be accurately predicting future fire activity.
... This could have profound implications for macroscale ecosystem conservation and restoration, emphasizing the necessity of incorporating both climate factors and topdown controls into management strategies, especially under uncertain climate change scenarios. 77,78 Furthermore, recognizing the differential responses between deterministic and uncertain ecosystems to various contributing factors like large herbivores and fire calls for more nuanced context-specific ecosystem management and restoration approaches compared to carbon-focused tree planting. 66 To foster resilient ecosystems and landscapes amid global change, a multiscale, multifactorial strategy, including the understanding and management of large herbivore assemblages and their collective effects on vegetation structure and biodiversity, is vital. ...
... Less attention is paid to concerns over the future supply of ecosystem services across spatiotemporal scales (Winkler et al., 2021) or how social-ecological systems are likely to respond and reorganise after a disturbance inside and outside the boundaries of protected areas (Bengtsson et al., 2003). With regard to accepting versus managing change, conservation adaptation frameworks such as Resist-Adapt-Direct (Lynch et al., 2021;Schuurman et al., 2021) or the resistance-resilience-transformation approach contribute to assessing the effect of climaterelated changes on conservation goals when defining management actions. ...
Protected areas are central for long‐term conservation of biodiversity and can potentially support climate change mitigation. But protected areas are also affected by climate change. Managers and scientists are increasingly facing the difficult task of making decisions under rapid change. Understanding individual and institutional futures considerations for adaptation is fundamental to evaluate whether protected area governance is adequate to anticipate, prepare and respond to climate change.
Using mixed qualitative methods, we analysed adaptation narratives extracted from 51 semi‐structured interviews with conservation practitioners and scientists involved in protected area management in Australia, Colombia and South Africa. We applied a multidimensional model to examine how people make sense of the concept of adaptation. The model allowed us to evaluate how different actors perceive and conceptualise the future and their level of awareness of climate change impacts on values of protected areas, as reflected in the expectations and motivations behind adaptation actions.
The results show a plurality of adaptation concepts and approaches. The narratives are framed under different governance approaches (top‐down, bottom‐up, participatory) influencing the sense of agency, the rationale for adaptation (adaptation of what and for whom) and the level of acceptance of change. Action time is associated with preferences and actions in response to ecological change, with more proactive action linked with systemic approaches.
We propose that examining world views underpinning how individuals and institutions make sense of the concept of adaptation can support future‐oriented conservation practices despite the inherent uncertainty of climate change. The narratives presented here may provide a basis to facilitate deliberations about current practices and identify potential contradictions between individual and collective aspirations for adaptation to create pathways for collective action towards desired futures.
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