Agroecosystems and climate change

In a chapter to appear in the Handbook of Climate Change and Agroecosystems, four approaches used to estimate the potential distribution of native and invasive species in agricultural, natural and medical/veterinary vector/disease systems in the face of climate change are reviewed: (1) time-series observations to document biological responses to changes in climatic variables; (2) remote sensing analysis of data; (3) climate envelope approaches (statistically-based ecological niche models and physiologically-based ecological niche models); (4) physiologically based demographic models. The bases and relative merits of the approaches are discussed. The chapter emphasizes physiologically based demographic models that may be used at the individual, population and regional scales. Such models easily include multiple trophic levels as demonstrated for the olive/olive scale system. The olive/olive-fly system embedded in a geographic information system (GIS) is used to illustrate the utility of the physiologically based demographic approach for climate change research. Applications to other crop/pest/natural enemy systems are also discussed. The use of marginal analysis to summarize regional simulation data is introduced.

Gutierrez A.P., Ponti L., Gilioli G., 2010. Climate change effects on plant-pest-natural enemy interactions. In: Hillel D., Rosenzweig, C. (eds.), Handbook of Climate Change and Agroecosystems: Impacts, Adaptation, and Mitigation. World Scientific Publishing, Singapore (in press).
http://www.worldscibooks.com/environsci/p755.html

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