Collaborative Research: MRA: Estimating and forecasting nonstationary, multi-scale climate and land-use effects on avian communities

全世界的鸟类数量都在减少，据估计，在过去的50年里，仅北美就损失了30亿只。这个项目的目标是研究两个主要的全球变化驱动因素，气候和土地利用变化，如何影响并将继续影响美国各地的鸟类繁殖。该研究结合了四个全国性的鸟类观测数据来源（国家生态观测站网络、eBird、繁殖鸟类调查和国家公园服务库存和监测计划），以估计过去20年气候和土地利用变化对6个鸟类群落中数百种物种的个体物种发生和生物多样性指标的历史影响。东部森林，西部森林，旱地，生境一般，草原，和城市/郊区。利用最近的估计，该项目将在本世纪中叶和世纪末的一系列预测气候和土地利用情景下预测鸟类的发生和分布。预测将用于识别美国多个空间尺度上的脆弱物种和鸟类群落。物种预测将考虑到多种不确定性来源，这对于了解在面临持续的全球变化的情况下，哪些保护工作可能产生最大的影响至关重要。这项工作的结果将通过一个基于网络的工具提供，这将为公众和资源管理者提供关于脆弱和有复原力的鸟类群落的详细信息，以加强全国范围内的鸟类管理。博士后和研究生将接受数据科学和统计方法方面的培训。本研究的重点是通过量化环境驱动因素的多尺度效应，在整合独立数据源的同时，通过开发“宏观系统综合群落占用模型”，评估和预测单个物种和整个生态群落的发生动态。该模型将应用于北美鸟类，以研究21世纪美国大陆生物地理群落中几种气候和土地利用变量对物种动态的影响。研究结果将有助于(1)对近20年来鸟类物种分布和生物多样性指标的宏观认识；(2)在合理的气候和土地利用情景下，预测美国大陆从局地到区域的分布动态，从而评估物种和群落对潜在全球变化的脆弱性。在此项目中开发的方法方法将扩大社区层面分析的范围，以涵盖物种加速丧失时代时空生物多样性变化的宏观驱动因素。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Birds are declining worldwide, with an estimated loss of three billion individuals in North America alone over the last 50 years. The goal of this project is to examine how two major global change drivers, climate and land-use change, have affected – and will continue to affect – breeding birds across the United States. The research combines bird observations from four nationwide data sources (National Ecological Observatory Network [NEON], eBird, Breeding Bird Survey, and National Park Service Inventory and Monitoring Program) to estimate the historical impacts of climate and land-use change on individual species’ occurrences and biodiversity metrics over the last two decades for hundreds of species within six avian communities: eastern forests, western forests, aridlands, habitat generalists, grasslands, and urban/suburban. Using estimates from the recent past, the project will then forecast bird occurrences and distributions under a range of projected climate and land-use scenarios during the mid-century and end-of-century. Forecasts will be used to identify vulnerable species and bird communities at multiple spatial scales across the United States. Species forecasts will account for multiple sources of uncertainty, which is critical for understanding where conservation efforts could have the greatest impact in the face of ongoing global change. Findings from this work will be available via a web-based tool, which will provide the public and resource managers with detailed information on both vulnerable and resilient bird communities to enhance avian stewardship nationwide. A post-doc and graduate student will be trained in data science and statistical methods. This research focuses on evaluating and forecasting the occurrence dynamics of both individual species and entire ecological communities by quantifying the multi-scale effects of environmental drivers, while simultaneously merging independent data sources, via development of a ‘macrosystems integrated community occupancy model.’ The model will be applied to North American avifauna to examine the effects of several climate and land-use variables on the dynamics of species across biogeographical communities in the continental United States throughout the 21st century. The results will lead to (1) a macroscale understanding of bird species’ distributions and biodiversity metrics during the last two decades; and (2) forecasts of distribution dynamics from local to regional scales across the continental United States under plausible climate and land-use scenarios, allowing for assessments of species and community vulnerabilities to potential global changes. The methodological approaches developed during this project will expand the scope of community-level analyses to encompass macroscale drivers of spatiotemporal biodiversity changes during an era of accelerated species loss.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.