Search

International audience

In accordance with their mission and as part of their long-term observation work, Ecrins National Park (NP) is making important contributions to the study and monitoring of phenomena related to climate change. Its work takes information collected at different meteorological stations and supplements it with analyses of vegetation changes through aerial and satellite images, measuring and monitoring of glaciers, and interdisciplinary programmes focused on high-altitude lakes, mountain pastures and indicator species. Through its mission and long-term observations, Ecrins NP (http://www.ecrinsparcnational. fr/) contributes to the environmental surveillance of many ecosystems. Working within many different networks and in partnership with various research teams, the park participates in the development of a better understanding of the important changes taking place.

In accordance with their mission and as part of their long-term observation work, Ecrins National Park (NP) is making important contributions to the study and monitoring of phenomena related to climate change. Its work takes information collected at different meteorological stations and supplements it with analyses of vegetation changes through aerial and satellite images, measuring and monitoring of glaciers, and interdisciplinary programmes focused on high-altitude lakes, mountain pastures and indicator species. Through its mission and long-term observations, Ecrins NP (http://www.ecrinsparcnational. fr/) contributes to the environmental surveillance of many ecosystems. Working within many different networks and in partnership with various research teams, the park participates in the development of a better understanding of the important changes taking place.

International audience

Vegetation is a key driver of ecosystem functioning (e.g. productivity and stability) and of the maintenance of biodiversity (e.g. creating habitats for other species groups). While vegetation sensitivity to climate change has been widely investigated, its spatio‐temporally response to the dual effects of land management and climate change has been ignored at landscape scale. Here we use a dynamic vegetation model called FATE‐HD, which describes the dominant vegetation dynamics and associated functional diversity, in order to anticipate vegetation response to climate and land‐use changes in both short and long‐term perspectives. Using three contrasted management scenarios for the Ecrins National Park (French Alps) developed in collaboration with the park managers, and one regional climate change scenario, we tracked the dynamics of vegetation structure (forest expansion) and functional diversity over 100 yr of climate change and a further 400 additional years of stabilization. As expected, we observed a slow upward shift in forest cover distribution, which appears to be severely impacted by pasture management (i.e. maintenance or abandonment). The time lag before observing changes in vegetation cover was the result of demographic and seed dispersal processes. However, plant diversity response to environmental changes was rapid. After land abandonment, local diversity increased and spatial turnover was reduced, whereas local diversity decreased following land use intensification. Interestingly, in the long term, as both climate and management scenarios interacted, the regional diversity declined. Our innovative spatio‐temporally explicit framework demonstrates that the vegetation may have contrasting responses to changes in the short and the long term. Moreover, climate and land‐abandonment interact extensively leading to a decrease in both regional diversity and turnover in the long term. Based on our simulations we therefore suggest a continuing moderate intensity pasturing to maintain high levels of plant diversity in this system., Ecography, 37 (12), ISSN:0906-7590, ISSN:1600-0587