Plant persistence and dispersal at multiple scales

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The major reshuffling of species distribution and abundance predicted from global change models is sending us back to the fundamentals of ecology and is expected to have unprecedented impacts, including economic ones, on biodiversity and natural resources. Yet, the ability to predict the combined effects on the future distribution of species of land use changes and rapid warming remains remarkably limited. Understanding how plants respond to these changes is important as plants structure habitats, provide resources to other species (including humans), and regulate biogeochemical flows. For ecologists and conservation specialists, there is an urgent need to reconcile the time scales and spatial extents of biological processes occurring at population and community levels (e.g., reproduction, dispersal) with those required to keep up with the magnitude and speed of environmental changes predicted by global models. Lessons from contemporary species invasion can be informative in this context as they underscore the potential for rapid adaptive responses from species, including climatic niche shifts, in facilitating species migration and range expansion. This research will provide the advanced knowledge necessary to understand and sustain ecological flows in managed landscapes in this century by testing predictions about plant species performance and distribution in a changing climate using field observations, controlled experiments, and modelling. The research has direct relevance for our collective engagement towards the conservation and management of biodiversity and its services given that global changes will inevitably challenge the accepted dichotomies on which we base many of our management decisions, such as the one between native vs. exotic species, rare vs. common species, or protected vs. unprotected areas. It will help us move towards a dynamic view of nature conservation.