Conservation status assessment of Paraphlebia damselflies in Mexico

Abstract

1. We assessed the conservation status of the three Mexican Paraphlebia damselflies based on the criterion B of the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature's (IUCN): P. hyalina, P. quinta, and P. zoe. According to this List, P. hyalina has not been evaluated, P. quinta appears as least concern, and P. zoe appears as Vulnerable. Geographical records were taken from literature, enquiries to specialists and field visits. We also projected the future potential geographical range area.2. We generated species distribution models (SDM) for P. quinta and P. zoe (as there were not enough records for P. hyalina) as a surrogate of the extension of occurrence (EOO) and also calculated the area of occupancy. Future distributions were projected for years 2020, 2050, and, 2080 based on predicted changes in climatic conditions.3. Species distribution models predicted current EOO areas for P. quinta and P. zoe as 18 860 and 16 440 km 2 , respectively, and around 50% of their distribution coincides with agricultural, pasture or urban sites. 4. Our SDM results indicate that IUCN-based conservation status of the three species should be changed as follows: P. quinta and P. zoe moved to endangered category, and P. hyalina to data-deficient category based on the reduced EOO areas and the historical loss of habitat.5. For P. quinta, future climatic projections suggest an initial reduction (2020) followed by an expansion (2050 and 2080) in suitable areas, whereas for P. zoe there will be a decrease in predicted area for the three time periods. Preserving areas that provide shade, high humidity and perching sites seems to be a key for Paraphlebia species survival.

Expected impacts of climate change threaten the anuran diversity in the Brazilian hotspots

“…The assessment of these climate change impacts on biodiversity mostly depends on extensive historical information of species distributions, which is unavailable or imprecise for most species in the biodiverse tropics. Therefore, the use of Ecological Niche Models (ENM; or Species Distribution Models: SDM; Araújo & Peterson, ) has become a widely used tool to anticipate the climate change effects on species distribution of a wide range of taxa and also to generate conservation strategies based on a dynamic changing climate in different regions of the world (Araújo, Alagador, Cabeza, Nogués‐Bravo, & Thuiller, ; Aryal et al., ; Cuevas‐Yáñez, Rivas, Muñoz, & Córdoba‐Aguilar, ; Fois, Cuena‐Lombraña, Fenu, Cogoni, & Bacchetta, ; Lemes & Loyola, ).…”

Estimating distribution area in six Argia damselflies (Insecta: Odonata: Coenagrionidae) including A. garrisoni, a threatened species

“…Our results indicated that A. garrisoni showed a distribution area of less than 20,000 km² (see below). Since a distribution area smaller than 20,000 km² is one of those criteria that allows categorizing whether any species may be threatened (IUCN, 2017), we took a step further to characterize the habitat of this species for any field assessment and/or future protection effort (for a similar approach, see Cuevas-Yáñez et al, 2015). For this characterization, all types of land use corresponding to the habitat of the species were selected and trimmed using both the soil cover layer and the vegetation cover of the Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Geografía (Inegi) (Union of Layers, Series V: Inegi, 2011), removing, for example, urbanized or arid zones that do not correspond to A. garrisoni's habitat, rendering a "clean" layer with this selection.…”

Evaluating Potential Distribution and Niche Divergence among Populations of the World’s Largest Living Damselfly, Megaloprepus caerulatus (Drury, 1782)

“…Therefore, they are extremely susceptible to forest conversion [34,39]. Land use change is perhaps the most important factor constricting and/or fragmenting their distribution range, as has been shown in other odonate species [13,54,104]. In addition, climate change may be a more unpredictable threat and could exacerbate the effects of forest fragmentation [39].…”

“…We used spatial environmental data relevant to the biology of the species to produce the dataset that would represent the ecological niches [52][53][54][55]. Climatic data were obtained from WorldClim Version 1.4 [56] (http://www.worldclim.org/ (accessed on 19 May 2018)).…”

“…In fact, many of these variables have also been of importance in other odonate ENMs [11,14]. We used spatial environmental data relevant to the biology of the species to produce the dataset that would represent the ecological niches [52][53][54][55]. Climatic data were obtained from WorldClim Version 1.4 [56] (http://www.worldclim.org/ (accessed on 19 May [35] and Fincke et al [31] as well as all historical records for the species (black circles).…”