Climate change leads to accelerated transformation of high‐elevation vegetation in the central Alps

Abstract

Summary High mountain ecosystems and their biota are governed by low‐temperature conditions and thus can be used as indicators for climate warming impacts on natural ecosystems, provided that long‐term data exist.We used data from the largest alpine to nival permanent plot site in the Alps, established in the frame of the Global Observation Research Initiative in Alpine Environments (GLORIA) on Schrankogel in the Tyrolean Alps, Austria, in 1994, and resurveyed in 2004 and 2014.Vascular plant species richness per plot increased over the entire period, albeit to a lesser extent in the second decade, because disappearance events increased markedly in the latter period. Although presence/absence data could only marginally explain range shift dynamics, changes in species cover and plant community composition indicate an accelerating transformation towards a more warmth‐demanding and more drought‐adapted vegetation, which is strongest at the lowest, least rugged subsite.Divergent responses of vertical distribution groups of species suggest that direct warming effects, rather than competitive displacement, are the primary causes of the observed patterns. The continued decrease in cryophilic species could imply that trailing edge dynamics proceed more rapidly than successful colonisation, which would favour a period of accelerated species declines.

Rapid changes in eastern Himalayan alpine flora with climate change

“…C). Similar vegetation increases to those we observed have been associated with temperature at other alpine sites throughout the world (Gottfried et al., ; Pauli et al., ; Telwala et al., ; Lamprecht et al, ; Steinbauer et al., ). Our study compares temperature differences among summits, rather than over time.…”

Thermal niche traits of high alpine plant species and communities across the tropical Andes and their vulnerability to global warming

“…physiological stress) and indirect (e.g. facilitation and competition among species) effects on species abundance changes and range shift (Anthelme, Cavieres, & Dangles, ; Lamprecht, Semenchuk, Steinbauer, Winkler, & Pauli, ), which are enhanced by topographic complexity in alpine environments (Graae et al, ) and limitations of plant dispersal and colonization (Zimmer et al, ). Yet, we did not account for such differential effects, because the study focuses on a large and complex mountain region and included many species, where little, if anything, is yet known about their individual responses to ongoing climate change.…”

“…physiological stress) and indirect (e.g. facilitation and competition among species) effects on species abundance changes and range shift (Anthelme, Cavieres, & Dangles, 2014;Lamprecht, Semenchuk, Steinbauer, Winkler, & Pauli, 2018), which are enhanced by topographic complexity in alpine environments (Graae et al, 2018) and limitations of plant dispersal and colonization (Zimmer et al, 2018).…”

Community turnover by composition and climatic affinity across scales in an alpine system

“…This international program was founded to provide cost‐effective, universal monitoring protocols and a unifying network to investigate the rate and magnitude of the changes in alpine communities through time and spatial patterning at local, regional, and global scales (Grabherr et al., ). This network has led to key findings about the vulnerability of montane systems to changing climate, including upward distributional shifts of many alpine species and loss of cool‐adapted species in mountains (Pauli et al., , ; Gottfried et al., ; Lamprecht et al., ; Rumpf et al., ; Steinbauer et al., ). The North American chapter was founded in 2004 (Millar and Fagre, ) with installations in California and Montana and now has installations in many mountain regions of North America.…”