Potential Distribution of Goldenrod (Solidago altissima L.) during Climate Change in South Korea

Abstract

Predictions of suitable habitat areas within a specific region can provide important information to assist in the management of invasive plants. Here, we predict the current and future potential distribution of Solidago altissima (tall goldenrod) in South Korea using climatic and topographic variables and anthropogenic activities. We adopt four single models (the generalized linear model, generalized additive model, random forest, and an artificial neural network) and a weighted ensemble model for the projection based on 515 field survey points. The results showed that suitable areas for S. altissima were mainly concentrated in the southwest regions of South Korea, where temperatures are higher than in other regions, especially in the winter season. Solar radiation and Topographic Wetness Index (TWI) were also positively associated with the occurrence of S. altissima. Anthropogenic effects and distances from rivers were found to be relatively less important variables. Based on six selected explanatory variables, suitable habitat areas for S. altissima have expanded remarkably with climate changes. This range expansion is likely to be stronger northward in west coastal areas. For the SSP585 scenario, our model predicted that suitable habitat areas increased from 16,255 km2 (16.2% of South Korea) to 44,551 km2 (44.4%) approximately over the past thirty years. Our results show that S. altissima is highly likely to expand into non-forest areas such as roadsides, waterfront areas, and abandoned urban areas. We propose that, based on our projection maps, S. altissima should be removed from its current margin areas first rather than from old central population areas.

Mowing inhibits the invasion of the alien species Solidago altissima and is an effective management strategy

“…It is already widely distributed along roadsides, riversides, and railways in the midwest of Honshu and Northern Kyushu (Nakagawa, Enomoto 1975) and expanded to all areas of Japan. However, the distribution of S. altissima in Korea was restricted to the southern areas, including only 35.5% of research sites in 2020 (Park et al 2020). Owing to the differences in invasion histories, it is meaningless to directly compare distributions in Korea and Japan.…”

Spatial scale matters for predicting plant invasions along roads

“…Fourth, we considered climatic factors (i.e. mean temperature, precipitation, solar radiation and growing season length), as goldenrod occurrence may be more likely in areas characterized by warm temperatures, humid conditions and high solar radiation (Park et al., 2020). Fifth, since biotic interactions among alien plants may intensify their ecosystem impacts and/or promote secondary invasions by other species (Simberloff & Von Holle, 1999), we considered indices describing the abundance and diversity of alien plant species other than goldenrods that were observed along the transects (13 species in total; the number of other alien plant species recorded along a transect ranged between 0 and 5).…”

Allelopathy and Allelochemicals of Solidago canadensis L. and S. altissima L. for Their Naturalization

“…This species has adapted to a wide range of soil fertility and water potential [ 8 , 11 , 12 ], as well as been colonized into disturbed areas such as abandoned fields, roadsides, riverbanks and forest edges [ 11 , 13 , 14 ]. The species established its population on an agriculture field in two years after the abandonment [ 15 , 16 ].…”