TY - JOUR
T1 - Niche conservatism
T2 - Integrating evolution, ecology, and conservation biology
AU - Wiens, John J.
AU - Graham, Catherine H.
N1 - Copyright:
Copyright 2008 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2005
Y1 - 2005
N2 - Niche conservatism is the tendency of species to retain ancestral ecological characteristics. In the recent literature, a debate has emerged as to whether niches are conserved. We suggest that simply testing whether niches are conserved is not by itself particularly helpful or interesting and that a more useful focus is on the patterns that niche conservatism may (or may not) create. We focus specifically on how niche conservatism in climatic tolerances may limit geographic range expansion and how this one type of niche conservatism may be important in (a) allopatric speciation, (b) historical biogeography, (c) patterns of species richness, (d) community structure, (e) the spread of invasive, human-introduced species, (f) responses of species to global climate change, and (g) human history, from 13,000 years ago to the present. We describe how these effects of niche conservatism can be examined with new tools for ecological niche modeling.
AB - Niche conservatism is the tendency of species to retain ancestral ecological characteristics. In the recent literature, a debate has emerged as to whether niches are conserved. We suggest that simply testing whether niches are conserved is not by itself particularly helpful or interesting and that a more useful focus is on the patterns that niche conservatism may (or may not) create. We focus specifically on how niche conservatism in climatic tolerances may limit geographic range expansion and how this one type of niche conservatism may be important in (a) allopatric speciation, (b) historical biogeography, (c) patterns of species richness, (d) community structure, (e) the spread of invasive, human-introduced species, (f) responses of species to global climate change, and (g) human history, from 13,000 years ago to the present. We describe how these effects of niche conservatism can be examined with new tools for ecological niche modeling.
KW - Biogeography
KW - Climate
KW - Invasive species
KW - Speciation
KW - Species richness
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U2 - 10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.36.102803.095431
DO - 10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.36.102803.095431
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:30344446365
VL - 36
SP - 519
EP - 539
JO - Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics
JF - Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics
SN - 1543-592X
ER -