Current and future plant invasions in protected areas: Does clonality matter?

Aim Protected areas (PAs) play an important role in biodiversity conservation, but remain increasingly threatened by invasive alien plant species (IAPS) conjunction with global climate change. The latter is modifying the distribution of former, and magnitude direction distributional changes are predicted to vary depending on dispersal mode. Here, we address question whether clonality expected affect future invasion pattern PAs. Location Worldwide. Time period 1950–2100. Major taxa studied 36 species. Methods We used ensembles three models (GLM, GAM Maxent) based >70,000 occurrence records project world's most clonal non-clonal plants >20,000 Projections were greenhouse gas concentration scenarios (low, medium high) for 2080. Results Climate change showed little impact PAs, effect when all biomes processed concert. However, discerned that risk IAPS markedly increased located at high elevation latitude compared IAPS, while decreased lower-elevation tropical subtropical where asexual reproduction may be a less successful trait. also hot spots overlapped two realms (i.e. Nearctic Palearctic), which calls bridging gap between conservation sciences more concerted management strategies. Main conclusions suggest effective PAs should consider as well reproductive traits present or become so.