Climate reconstruction analysis using coexistence likelihood estimation (CRACLE): a method for the estimation of climate using vegetation.
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OBJECTIVE
Plant distributions have long been understood to be correlated with the environmental conditions to which species are adapted. Climate is one of the major components driving species distributions. Therefore, it is expected that the plants coexisting in a community are reflective of the local environment, particularly climate.•


METHODS
Presented here is a method for the estimation of climate from local plant species coexistence data. The method, Climate Reconstruction Analysis using Coexistence Likelihood Estimation (CRACLE), is a likelihood-based method that employs specimen collection data at a global scale for the inference of species climate tolerance. CRACLE calculates the maximum joint likelihood of coexistence given individual species climate tolerance characterization to estimate the expected climate.•


RESULTS
Plant distribution data for more than 4000 species were used to show that this method accurately infers expected climate profiles for 165 sites with diverse climatic conditions. Estimates differ from the WorldClim global climate model by less than 1.5°C on average for mean annual temperature and less than ∼250 mm for mean annual precipitation. This is a significant improvement upon other plant-based climate-proxy methods.•


CONCLUSIONS
CRACLE validates long hypothesized interactions between climate and local associations of plant species. Furthermore, CRACLE successfully estimates climate that is consistent with the widely used WorldClim model and therefore may be applied to the quantitative estimation of paleoclimate in future studies.
Section of Plant Biology, 412 Mann Library, School of Integrative Plant Science, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA L.H. Bailey Hortorium, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA.
Robert S
RS
Harbert
Section of Plant Biology, 412 Mann Library, School of Integrative Plant Science, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA L.H. Bailey Hortorium, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA.
Kevin C
KC
Nixon
D002980:Climate; D016013:Likelihood Functions; D055904:Meteorology / Q000379:methods*; D008954:Models, Biological; D063148:Plant Dispersal
GBIF; WorldClim; climate change; climate niches; ecological filtering; paleoclimate; plant community; species coexistence; vegetation