Selecting pseudo‐absences for species distribution models: how, where and how many?

Barbet‐Massin, Morgane; Jiguet, Frédéric; Albert, Cécile H.; Thuiller, Wilfried

doi:10.1111/j.2041-210x.2011.00172.x

Cited by 1,999 publications

(1,794 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…Because absence records of the koala were not available, we generated pseudoabsence data points, as many as the number of presences, randomly across the Eden region (Elith et al 2006). Randomly selected, pseudo-absences have been shown to yield the most reliable logistic-regression species-distribution models (Wisz and Guisan 2009;Stokland et al 2011;Barbet-Massin et al 2012).…”

Section: Change In Koala Distribution and Logistic Modellingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Extinction in Eden: identifying the role of climate change in the decline of the koala in south-eastern NSW

et al. 2014

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Context. Reviews of climate change in Australia have identified that it is imposing additional stresses on biodiversity, which is already under threat from multiple human impacts.Aims. The present study aimed to determine the contributions of several factors to the demise of the koala in the Eden region in south-eastern New South Wales and, in particular, to establish to what extent climate change may have exacerbated the decline.Methods. The study built on several community-based koala surveys in the Eden region since 1986, verified through interviews with survey respondents. Historical records as far back as the late 19th century, wildlife databases and field-based surveys were used to independently validate the community survey data and form a reliable picture of changes in the Eden koala population. Analysis of the community survey data used a logistic model to assess the contribution of known threats to koalas, including habitat loss measured as changes in foliage projective cover, fire, increases in the human population and climate change in the form of changes in temperature and rainfall, to the regional decline of this species.Key results. We found a marked, long-term shrinkage in the distribution of the koala across the Eden region. Our modelling demonstrated that a succession of multiple threats to koalas from land use (human population growth and habitat loss) and environmental change (temperature increase and drought) were significant contributors to this decline.Conclusions. Climate change, particularly drought and rising temperatures, has been a hitherto hidden factor that has been a major driver of the decline of the koala in the Eden region.Implications. Development of strategies to help fauna adapt to the changing climate is of paramount importance, particularly at a local scale.

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Section: Change In Koala Distribution and Logistic Modellingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Extinction in Eden: identifying the role of climate change in the decline of the koala in south-eastern NSW

et al. 2014

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“…The climate data for these points were obtained from the WorldClim database (48). Addition of pseudo-absence data to presence-only data are a standard procedure in ecological modeling (49,50).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Human population dynamics in Europe over the Last Glacial Maximum

Tallavaara

Luoto

Korhonen

et al. 2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

160

109

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The severe cooling and the expansion of the ice sheets during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), 27,000-19,000 y ago (27-19 ky ago) had a major impact on plant and animal populations, including humans. Changes in human population size and range have affected our genetic evolution, and recent modeling efforts have reaffirmed the importance of population dynamics in cultural and linguistic evolution, as well. However, in the absence of historical records, estimating past population levels has remained difficult. Here we show that it is possible to model spatially explicit human population dynamics from the pre-LGM at 30 ky ago through the LGM to the Late Glacial in Europe by using climate envelope modeling tools and modern ethnographic datasets to construct a population calibration model. The simulated range and size of the human population correspond significantly with spatiotemporal patterns in the archaeological data, suggesting that climate was a major driver of population dynamics 30-13 ky ago. The simulated population size declined from about 330,000 people at 30 ky ago to a minimum of 130,000 people at 23 ky ago. The Late Glacial population growth was fastest during Greenland interstadial 1, and by 13 ky ago, there were almost 410,000 people in Europe. Even during the coldest part of the LGM, the climatically suitable area for human habitation remained unfragmented and covered 36% of Europe.hunter-gatherers | demography | niche modeling | climate change | Paleolithic G rowing populations of anatomically and behaviorally modern humans have been partly responsible for past ecosystem changes such as the extinctions of Pleistocene megafauna and Neanderthal humans (1, 2). In addition to the destiny of other species, human population size also influences our own cultural and genetic evolution. Large pools of interacting individuals can create and maintain adaptive skills, as well as phonological variation, more effectively than small populations, and they are also capable of faster cumulative cultural evolution (3-5). A decrease in population size may even result in a loss of complex cultural traits (6). The effects of population size on cultural variation are thus roughly similar to the effects of population size on genetic variation (7).The study of the role of human population size in cultural and genetic evolution and past ecosystem changes necessitates estimates of population dynamics extending far beyond historical times. The archaeological record illustrates patterns of human population range and size dynamics (8-10), but it does not offer quantitative population size data. Archaeological reconstructions of population dynamics are also bound to the regions and time periods that offer a sufficiently rich archaeological record. In addition to archaeological data, information on past population patterns can be inferred from genetic data using skyline-plot methods (11) and pairwise or multiple sequentially Markovian coalescent analyzes (12, 13). However, these methods depend on estimates of DNA mutation rate and ...

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“…A variety of procedures exist for simulating absence points in such situations, and the resulting absence points are referred to as pseudoabsence points. Analyses with simulated data suggest that the method used to generate such pseudoabsences is one of the smallest sources of error in species distribution modeling (35). We follow a procedure shown to be less biased than alternative methods (35) to generate pseudoabsence data: we create a mask of 0.1°surrounding presence points and then randomly select 10,000 points not in this mask but in Australia (including Tasmania).…”

Section: (Ref 21 Has a Full Description Of The Model And Its Assumptmentioning

confidence: 99%

Invasive plants have broader physiological niches

Higgins

Richardson

2014

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

109

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Invasive species cost the global economy billions of dollars each year, but ecologists have struggled to predict the risk of an introduced species naturalizing and invading. Although carefully designed experiments are needed to fully elucidate what makes some species invasive, much can be learned from unintentional experiments involving the introduction of species beyond their native ranges. Here, we assess invasion risk by linking a physiologically based species distribution model with data on the invasive success of 749 Australian acacia and eucalypt tree species that have, over more than a century, been introduced around the world. The model correctly predicts 92% of occurrences observed outside of Australia from an independent dataset. We found that invasiveness is positively associated with the projection of physiological niche volume in geographic space, thereby illustrating that species tolerant of a broader range of environmental conditions are more likely to be invasive. Species achieve this broader tolerance in different ways, meaning that the traits that define invasive success are context-specific. Hence, our study reconciles studies that have failed to identify the traits that define invasive success with the urgent and pragmatic need to predict invasive success.biological invasion | range size | physiology | ecological niche | tree invasions W hy some species perform better than others when introduced to novel regions is a question of immense theoretical and practical importance. Theoretical ecologists seek to understand the conditions that allow species to invade communities and coexist with other taxa, thereby shaping patterns of biodiversity (1, 2). Applied ecologists need to know which introduced species are most likely to establish, invade, and cause environmental damage (3). More generally, biological invasions are grand natural experiments that provide one of ecology's most profitable avenues for testing our ability to forecast the distribution of species and diversity (4).Although theoretical ecologists have made impressive progress in understanding the mediators of coexistence using invasion tests (5, 6), applied ecologists bemoan the fact that predicting the next environmental pest seems as intractable now as decades ago, when the global consequences of invasions first became apparent (7). Although many studies have deciphered the attributes of successful invaders (8), others show that invasive organisms do not differ in consistent ways from native taxa and that, if laws do determine invasiveness and invasibility, they are, at best, highly context-specific (9-11). Such uncertainty is perhaps not surprising, because the study of invasions is, by definition, complicated by historical factors. For example, increased propagule pressure and residence time increase invasive success, together often overwhelming any inherent factors that enhance or limit invasiveness (12-14). Hence, invasion biology seems resigned to accepting that a universal definition of invasibility and invasiveness is unlike...

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Selecting pseudo‐absences for species distribution models: how, where and how many?

Cited by 1,999 publications

References 37 publications

Extinction in Eden: identifying the role of climate change in the decline of the koala in south-eastern NSW

Extinction in Eden: identifying the role of climate change in the decline of the koala in south-eastern NSW

Human population dynamics in Europe over the Last Glacial Maximum

Invasive plants have broader physiological niches

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