A study of the impacts of climate change on the geographic distribution of Pinus koraiensis in China

• Published in: Environment international 2001-09, Vol.27 (2), p.201-205
• Main Authors: Xu, Deying, Yan, Hong
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Agricultural and forest climatology and meteorology. Irrigation. Drainage; Agricultural and forest meteorology; Agronomy. Soil science and plant productions; Asia; Biological and medical sciences; China; Chorology; Climate change; Climatology, meteorology; Environmental Monitoring; Forestry; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; General agronomy. Plant production; General forest ecology; Generalities. Production, biomass. Quality of wood and forest products. General forest ecology; Generalities. Techniques. Climatology. Meteorology. Climatic models of plant production; Geographic distribution; Geography; Greenhouse Effect; Korean pine; Models, Theoretical; Pinus - physiology; Pinus koraiensis; Plant cytology, morphology, systematics, chorology and evolution; Population Dynamics
• ISSN: 0160-4120; 1873-6750
• DOI: 10.1016/S0160-4120(01)00083-6

The climatic conditions and elevation of the potential distribution area of Korean pine ( Pinus koraiensis Sieb. et Zucc) in China were determined by an ecological information system GREEN that has been developed by [Yan H, Booth TH, Zuo H, editors. GREEN — a climatic mapping program for China and its use in forestry. In: Matching trees and sites, ACIAR Proceedings No. 63. Australia: ACIAR, 1996]. The potential distribution areas of this tree species under current and predicted climatic conditions were mapped using IDRISI GIS. Based on the averages of rainfall and temperature predicted by 5 GCMs (GISS, NCAR, OSU, UKMO and MPI, i.e., an “averaged” model) and a new model HadCM2 for 2030, predictions were made on the future distributions of Korean pine. The result shows that the southern boundary of the potential distribution area of Korean pine will have a northward shift of 0.1° to 0.6° in latitude, and the northern boundary will have a northward shift of 0.3° to 0.5°, resulting in an expansion of the potential distribution area by 3.4% according to the average of the five models. However, the distribution areas will be decreased by 12.1% and 44.9% according to the scenarios predicted by HadCM2, which assumes annual increments of CO 2 concentrations of 0.5% and 1%, respectively. The authors concluded that if the thresholds were properly selected the actual distribution and potential distribution of a tree species might agree. The projected distribution under changed climatic conditions depends on the GCM scenarios applied. Different GCM scenarios may sometimes give opposite conclusions, as in the case of Korean pine projected by the “averaged” and HadCM2 models.