The role of climatic mapping in predicting the potential geographical distribution of non-indigenous pests under current and future climates

Climatic mapping, which predicts the potential distribution of organisms in new areas and under future climates based on their responses to climate in their home range, has recently been criticised for ignoring dispersal and interactions between species, such as competition, predation and parasitism. In order to determine whether these criticisms are justified, the different procedures employed in climatic mapping were reviewed, with examples taken from studies of the Mediterranean fruit fly (Ceratitis capitata), Karnal bunt of wheat (Tilletia indica) and the Colorado potato beetle (Leptinotarsa decemlineata). All these studies stressed the key role played by non-climatic factors in determining distribution but it was shown that these factors, e.g., the availability of food and synchrony with the host plant, together with the difficulties of downscaling and upscaling data, were different to those highlighted in the criticisms. The extent to which laboratory studies on Drosophila populations, on which the criticisms are based, can be extrapolated to general predictions of species distributions was also explored. The Drosophila experiments were found to illustrate the importance of climate but could not accurately determine potential species distributions because only adult and not breeding population densities were estimated. The experimental design overestimated species interactions and ignored other factors, such as the availability of food. It was concluded that while there are limitations, climatic mapping procedures continue to play a vital role in determining what G.E. Hutchinson defined as the “fundamental niche” in studies of potential distribution. This applies especially for pest species, where natural dispersal is generally less important than transport by man, and species interactions are limited by the impoverished species diversity in agroecosystems. Due to the lack of data, climatic mapping is often the only approach which can be adopted. Nevertheless, to ensure that non-climatic factors are not neglected in such studies, a standard framework should be employed. Such frameworks have already been developed for pest risk analyses and are suitable for general use in studies of potential distribution because, in order to justify the phytosanitary regulation of international trade, they must also consider the potential for pests to invade new areas and the impacts of such invasions. © 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.