Abundance improves species distribution models

An important component of the work done in the CEG examines how species will respond to environmental change. Species distribution models are often used to understand why species are found in particular areas, and where they might occur in the future. There are many modelling approaches utilizing different types of data, and there is much debate about what types of models make the best predictions. Christine Howard et al., in a paper in press in Methods in Ecology and Evolution, compared European bird distribution models built with presence-absence data to those built with abundance data. They found that models which used bird abundance were better able to predict species distributions and provided additional information on abundance patterns. Their findings suggest that, where available, species abundance data should be used to develop models of the impacts of environmental change, and highlights the value of collecting species abundance data.

For more information can be found on-line and on Christine's page.