Grant: Discovery Grants Program - Individual

Extreme weather events are becoming more severe and more frequent as a result of human-induced climate change. These can include unprecedented heat waves, exceptionally heavy rainfall, and prolonged drought. But, what are the effects of such events on species' survival? Weather extremes might force species to move elsewhere, which can be risky. New work shows that such events alter species' conservation outlook. But climate changes can also change seasonal timing of species, shifting their activities to earlier in the season. These phenological changes help species to escape more extreme weather later in the season, which may benefit them or potentially expose them to more uncertain conditions that create challenges to their persistence. Shifts in where species are found and when they are active appear to be two sides of the same coin: species have a range of tolerances set by their evolutionary history and by interactions with other species. New research has begun to account for both seasonal timing and geographical range shifts in terms of how species react to climate change. This proposal seeks to advance this emerging synthesis in three key ways. First, we recognize that a pathway of climate change impacts on species runs through the effects of extreme weather, which we have built into our work, testing how dragonfly and damselfly species have responded over recent decades to changing climate and extreme weather that approaches or exceeds the realized niche limits of species in Europe and North America. Individual species' traits might attenuate or amplify effects of environmental change, so we will consider these traits in the context of species' shared evolutionary history. Second, using a huge, and growing, butterfly population database, we will evaluate population trends in butterfly species relative to the environmental changes described above, as well as land use intensification. Species responding to climate change must ultimately show a population trend, which we investigate interannually over decades using these data and high resolution spatiotemporal weather and land use observations. Finally, we will integrate these ideas into analyses of an assemblage of interacting butterfly species communities in habitats near Ottawa, considering potential effects of predators and landscape connectivity. Many factors can affect ecological communities, and our long term objective is to understand how species and biological communities respond to environmental change, adding to our track record of improving policy. This research includes work across different scales, from individual habitats to continent-spanning, with an array of projects intended to improve prospects for reducing rates of biodiversity loss among vulnerable species and ecosystems. Throughout this research program, we aim to equip new generations of professional scientists with critical skills that launch and sustain high impact careers.