Climate change effect on the widely distributed Palearctic plant bug species (Insecta: Heteroptera: Miridae)

• Published in: PeerJ (San Francisco, CA) CA), 2024-11, Vol.12, p.e18377, Article e18377
• Main Authors: Namyatova, Anna A, Dzhelali, Polina A, Tyts, Veronica D, Popkov, Alexander A
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Analysis; Animals; Asia; Biodiversity; Biogeography; Climate Change; Climate Change Biology; Climatic conditions; Climatic variables; Distribution; Ecology; Ecosystem; Entomology; Environmental niche modeling; Europe; Geographical distribution; Global warming; Heteroptera; Heteroptera - growth & development; Heteroptera - physiology; Insecta; Insects; Liocoris tripustulatus; Lygocoris pabulinus; Lygus punctatus; Miridae; Mirini; Principal components analysis; Regression analysis; Species; Temperature
• ISSN: 2167-8359; 2167-8359
• DOI: 10.7717/peerj.18377

Insects are poikilothermic organisms and temperature increase usually accelerates their development rates, population and distribution area growth. Therefore, it is assumed that global warming can be beneficial for the pests and other widespread species at least in the relatively cool temperate zones. However, climate change's effect on the widespread species in the Palearctic remains poorly studied. This work was performed on three plant bug species (Insecta: Heteroptera: Miridae), at present inhabiting Europe and Asia. is known from the Western Palearctic, occupies the territories from Western Europe to South Asia, is distributed from Northern Europe to the Far East. In this paper, it is tested whether temperature rise is positively connected with the area of preferred climatic conditions for those species, and explores the particular climatic variables which can be limiting for the distribution of those species. Maxent software was used for the environmental niche modeling and to find the variables with significant contribution to the climatic models for the studied species. Based on those models, areas with preferred climatic conditions over different periods were calculated in QGIS. Principal component analysis and logistic regression were performed to find the variables highly contributing to the differences between the species. The results contradict the assumption that temperature growth alone can be a predictor for the widespread species and pest distribution range change. All species differ in suitable climatic conditions and their area dynamics in time, and the temperature affects each species differently. Only might significantly expand its distribution area by 2070 due to the climate change. The areas in Asia and above the polar circle will be more suitable by that time for all three species than now. However, conditions in Europe might be less suitable for and in the future. Both, temperature and precipitation variables, can be important for shaping distribution of and . Mean annual temperature and temperature in winter, most probably, limit the distribution of at least and , but changes in this variable affect those two species differently.