Climate, icing, and wild arctic reindeer: past relationships and future prospects
Climate, icing, and wild arctic reindeer: past relationships and future prospects
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DOI：
10.1890/11-0095.1
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发表时间：
2011-10-01
期刊：
影响因子：
4.8
通讯作者：
Saether, Bernt-Erik
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Hansen, Brage Bremset;Aanes, Ronny;Saether, Bernt-Erik
在整个北极地区，强降雨降雪（ROS）是一种“极端”气候事件，随着全球变暖，这种事件预计将变得越来越频繁。这可能会对生态系统产生巨大影响，因为积雪特性和地面结冰的变化会阻碍食草动物获得冬季食物，从而抑制它们的人口增长率。然而，支持这一点的经验证据仍然有限。我们监测了斯瓦尔巴驯鹿（Rangifer tarandus platyrhynchus）超种群的冬末积雪特性，以研究结冰的原因和后果。在这个高北极地区，每年都发生严重的ROS，在2000-2010年采样期间，地面冰覆盖了25%至96%的低海拔栖息地。地表结冰程度随年重ROS日数（>= 10 mm）的增加而增加，对驯鹿种群增长率有较强的负面影响。我们的研究结果具有重要意义，因为缩小尺度的气候预测（2021-2050）表明未来ROS和结冰将大幅增加。本研究首次从经验上证明了温暖湿润的冬季气候通过产生冰封牧场来影响大型食草动物种群动态。这可以作为冬季气候变化和北极生态系统极端天气事件重要性的早期预警。
Across the Arctic, heavy rain-on-snow (ROS) is an "extreme" climatic event that is expected to become increasingly frequent with global warming. This has potentially large ecosystem implications through changes in snowpack properties and ground-icing, which can block the access to herbivores' winter food and thereby suppress their population growth rates. However, the supporting empirical evidence for this is still limited. We monitored late winter snowpack properties to examine the causes and consequences of ground-icing in a Svalbard reindeer (Rangifer tarandus platyrhynchus) metapopulation. In this high-arctic area, heavy ROS occurred annually, and ground-ice covered from 25% to 96% of low-altitude habitat in the sampling period (2000-2010). The extent of ground-icing increased with the annual number, of days with heavy ROS (>= 10 mm) and had a strong negative effect on reindeer population growth rates. Our results have important implications as a downscaled climate projection (2021-2050) suggests a substantial future increase in ROS and icing. The present study is the first to demonstrate empirically that warmer and wetter winter climate influences large herbivore population dynamics by generating ice-locked pastures. This may serve as an early warning of the importance of changes in winter climate and extreme weather events in arctic ecosystems.