DOI: 10.5061/dryad.h9w0vt4sm
title: Prospects for Neotropical forest birds and their habitats under contrasting emissions scenarios

description: Current and near-future climate policy will fundamentally influence the
 integrity of ecological systems. The Neotropics is a region where
 biodiversity is notably high and precipitation regimes largely determine
 the ecology of most organisms. We modeled possible changes in the severity
 of seasonal aridity by 2100 throughout the Neotropics and used birds to
 illustrate the implications of contrasting climate scenarios for the
 region’s biodiversity. Under SSP-8.5, a pessimistic and hopefully unlikely
 scenario, longer dry seasons (&gt; 5%) and increased moisture stress
 are projected for about 75% of extant lowland forests throughout the
 entire region with impacts on 66% of the region’s lowland forest avifauna
 which comprises over 3,000 species and about 30% of all bird species
 globally. Longer dry seasons are predicted to be especially significant in
 the Caribbean, Upper South America, and Amazonia. In contrast, under
 SSP-2.6 - a scenario with significant climate mitigation – only about 10%
 of the entire region’s forest area and 3% of its avifauna will be exposed
 to longer dry seasons. Moreover, the extent of current forest cover that
 may plausibly function as precipitation-based climate refugia (i.e.,
 &lt; 5% change in length of dry periods) for constituent biodiversity
 is over 4 times greater under SSP-2.6 than with SSP-8.5 and the proportion
 of currently protected areas that overlap putative refugia areas is also
 nearly 4 times greater under SSP-2.6. Taken together, our results
 illustrate that climate policy will have profound outcomes for
 biodiversity throughout the Neotropics - even in areas where deforestation
 and other immediate threats are not currently in play.
description: # Prospects for Neotropical forest birds and their habitats under
 contrasting emissions scenarios
 [https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.h9w0vt4sm](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.h9w0vt4sm) ## Description of the data and file structure The file `cleanhex_subrealm_85 final.csv` refers to the climate and bird species under the SSP 8.5 climate scenario as it relates to predicted changes in dry season length in new world tropical forest.  The file `cleanhex_subrealm_26 final.csv` refers to the climate and bird species under the SSP 2.6 climate scenario as it relates to predicted changes in dry season length in new world tropical forest.   * Fid_1 = unique id of each 10km2 hexgrid cell * DEM_mean = mean elevation of the hexgrid cell based on digital elevation models * DSLdiff_me = difference in historic and predicted dry season length. * DSPrc_mean = predicted mean dry season length * Subrealm = the name of the biogeographic in which the hexgrid cell is located * Dsl_hist_m = the historic average dry season length of the hexgrid cell based on climate data from 1970-2000. * SpRich =  the number of resident bird species that inhabit the hexgrid cell * RareWt = the rarity weighted richness (see formula in methods of the paper) of the bird species that inhabit the hexgrid cell. * Rwt_combo = rarity weighted richness multiplied by the predicted dry season length * Rich_combo = species richness multiplied by the predicted dry season length * Refugia10 =  Binary categorization if a hexgrid location is predicted to be a future climate refugium or not. Based on a predicted dry season length change of less than or greater than 10%. Less than 10% predicted change is considered refugia and is denoted by 0. Greater than 10% change is considered not to be a future climate refugia and is denoted by 1.   A third file entitled `WDPA_Supplemental Table3`. Lists all of the protected areas in this research paper. It also shows the amount of projected dry season level change for each protected areas. Positive numbers indicate protected areas that are predicted to have longer dry seasons and negative numbers will have shorter dry seasons. * Protected Area ID = The unique identifier for each protected area in the WDPA dataset * Protected Area Name = the name of the protected area as it is in the WDPA * IUCN Category = the level of the type of protected area classification according to the IUCN Redlist * Country = the country where the protected area is located * Subrealm = the biogeographical region where the protected area is located * DSL 8.5 (% change) = the percent change in the length of the dry season for the protected area according to the projected changes in precipitation under the SSP 8.5 scenario * DSL 2.6 (% change) = the percent change in the length of the dry season for the protected area according to the projected changes in precipitation under the SSP 2.6 scenario The remaining files include the R code that summarized the results from the GIS analysis of predicted dry season length changes and where they will impact bird species (`8SpeciesbyQuartile26.R` and `9Speciesby Quartile85.R`), protected areas (`WDPA_quartilesperSubrealm26.R`), and subrealms (`12SubrealmbyQuartilebreakdown2610pct.R` and `11SubrealmbyQuartilebreakdown85_10pct.R`) under SSP scenarios 2.6 and 8.5.