Topographic depressions can provide climate and resource microrefugia for biodiversity

Kata Frei; András Vojtkó; Tünde Farkas; László Erdős; Károly Barta; Anna E-Vojtkó; Csaba Tölgyesi; Zoltán Bátori

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2023.108202

Topographic depressions can provide climate and resource microrefugia for biodiversity

iScience. 2023 Oct 21;26(11):108202. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2023.108202. eCollection 2023 Nov 17.

Authors

Kata Frei^{1

2}, András Vojtkó³, Tünde Farkas⁴, László Erdős^{5

6}, Károly Barta⁷, Anna E-Vojtkó⁸, Csaba Tölgyesi^{1

9

10}, Zoltán Bátori^{1

9}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Ecology, University of Szeged, Közép fasor 52, 6726 Szeged, Hungary.
² Doctoral School of Environmental Sciences, University of Szeged, Rerrich Béla tér 1, 6720 Szeged, Hungary.
³ Department of Botany and Plant Physiology, Eszterházy Károly Catholic University, Leányka utca 6, 3300 Eger, Hungary.
⁴ Aggtelek National Park Directorate, Tengerszem oldal 1, 3758 Jósvafő, Hungary.
⁵ Institute of Ecology and Botany, Centre for Ecological Research, Alkotmány utca 2-4, 2163 Vácrátót, Hungary.
⁶ Department of Ecology, University of Debrecen, Egyetem tér 1, 4032 Debrecen, Hungary.
⁷ Department of Geoinformatics, Physical and Environmental Geography, University of Szeged, Egyetem utca 2-6, 6722 Szeged, Hungary.
⁸ Institute of Botany, Czech Academy of Sciences, Dukelská 135, 379 82 Třeboň, Czech Republic.
⁹ MTA-SZTE 'Lendület' Applied Ecology Research Group, Közép fasor 52, 6726 Szeged, Hungary.
¹⁰ HUN-REN-UD Functional and Restoration Ecology Research Group, Egyetem tér 1, 4032 Debrecen, Hungary.

Abstract

Microrefugia are often located within topographically complex regions where stable environmental conditions prevail. Most of the studies concerning the distributions of climate change-sensitive species have emphasized the dominance of cold air pooling over other environmental factors, such as resource availability. There is a shortage of information on the relationships among topography-related microsite diversity, microclimate, resource availability, and species composition in microrefugia. To fill this knowledge gap, we studied the effects of microclimatic conditions and soil resources on plant species occurrence within and adjacent to 30 large topographic depressions (i.e., dolines) in two distant karst regions. Our results showed that both microclimate and soil resource availability may play a key role in maintaining climate change-sensitive species and biodiversity in dolines; therefore, they may simultaneously act as climate and resource microrefugia. Establishing climate-smart conservation priorities and strategies is required to maintain or increase the refugial capacity of such safe havens.

Keywords: Ecology; Environmental science; Nature conservation; Plant ecology.