Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.
Tigray Agricultural Research Institute, Mekelle, Ethiopia.
Sci Rep. 2024 Jul 9;14(1):15866. doi: 10.1038/s41598-024-66949-3.
Climate change significantly affects the diversity, growth, and survival of indigenous plant species thereby influencing the nutrition, health and productivity of honey bees (Apis mellifera). Hypoestes forskaolii (Vahl) is one of the major honey bee plant species in Ethiopia's Tigray region. It is rich in pollen and nectar that typically provides white honey, which fetches a premium price in both local and inter-national markets. Despite its socio-economic and apicultural significance, the distribution of H. forskaolii has been declining, raising concerns regarding its conservation efforts. However, there is limited knowledge on how environmental and climatic factors affect its current distribution and response to future climate change. The study investigates the current and projected (the 2030s, 2050s, 2070s, and 2090s) habitat distributions of H. forskaolii under three future climate change scenarios (ssp126, ssp245, and ssp585) using the Maximum Entropy Model (MaxEnt). The results show that land use (50.1%), agro-ecology (28%), precipitation during the Driest Quarter (11.2%) and soil texture (6.1%) predominantly influence the distribution of H. forskaolii, collectively explaining 95.4% of the model's predictive power. Habitats rich in evergreen trees and mosaic herbaceous with good vegetation cover are identified as the most suitable for H. forskaolii. The spatial distribution of H. forskaolii is concentrated in the highlands and mid-highlands of the eastern and southern parts of Tigray, characterized by a colder temperature. Across the three climate change scenarios, the size of suitable habitat for H. forskaolii is projected to decrease over the four time periods studied. Predictions under the ssp585 scenario reveal alarming results, indicating a substantial decrease in the suitable habitat for H. forskaolii from 4.26% in the 2030s to 19.09% in the 2090s. Therefore, given the challenges posed by climate change, research efforts should focus on identifying and evaluating new technologies that can help the H. forskaolii species in adapting and mitigating the effects of climate change.
气候变化显著影响土著植物物种的多样性、生长和存活，从而影响蜜蜂（Apis mellifera）的营养、健康和生产力。Hypoestes forskaolii（Vahl）是埃塞俄比亚提格雷地区主要的蜜蜂植物物种之一。它富含花粉和花蜜，通常提供白色蜂蜜，在当地和国际市场上都有很高的价格。尽管它具有社会经济和养蜂意义，但 H. forskaolii 的分布一直在减少，这引起了人们对其保护工作的关注。然而，对于环境和气候因素如何影响其当前分布以及对未来气候变化的响应，人们知之甚少。本研究使用最大熵模型（MaxEnt）调查了 H. forskaolii 在三种未来气候变化情景（ssp126、ssp245 和 ssp585）下的当前和预测（2030 年代、2050 年代、2070 年代和 2090 年代）的生境分布。结果表明，土地利用（50.1%）、农业生态（28%）、最干燥季度的降水量（11.2%）和土壤质地（6.1%）主要影响 H. forskaolii 的分布，共同解释了模型预测能力的 95.4%。常绿树木丰富的生境和镶嵌草本植物与良好的植被覆盖被确定为最适合 H. forskaolii 的生境。H. forskaolii 的空间分布集中在提格雷东部和南部的高地和中高海拔地区，那里的温度较低。在三种气候变化情景下，研究期间四个时期 H. forskaolii 的适宜生境面积预计都将减少。ssp585 情景下的预测结果令人担忧，表明 H. forskaolii 的适宜生境面积从 2030 年代的 4.26%大幅减少到 2090 年代的 19.09%。因此，鉴于气候变化带来的挑战，研究工作应集中于识别和评估新技术，帮助 H. forskaolii 物种适应和减轻气候变化的影响。
