title: Performance of climate envelope models in retrodicting recent changes in bird population size from observed climatic change.
abstract: Twenty-five-year population trends of 42 bird species rare as breeders in the UK were examined in relation to changes in climatic suitability simulated using climatic envelope models. The effects of a series of potential 'nuisance' variables were also assessed. A statistically significant positive correlation was found across species between population trend and climate suitability trend. The demonstration that climate envelope models are able to retrodict species' population trends provides a valuable validation of their use in studies of the potential impacts of future climatic changes.
authors.affiliation: Conservation Science Group, Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK. reg29@hermes.cam.ac.uk
authors.forename: Rhys E
authors.initials: RE
authors.lastname: Green
authors.forename: Yvonne C
authors.initials: YC
authors.lastname: Collingham
authors.forename: Stephen G
authors.initials: SG
authors.lastname: Willis
authors.forename: Richard D
authors.initials: RD
authors.lastname: Gregory
authors.forename: Ken W
authors.initials: KW
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.forename: Brian
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Huntley
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001717:Birds; D005843:Geography; D017752:Greenhouse Effect; D008954:Models, Biological; D011157:Population Dynamics; D006113:United Kingdom