Effects of Climate Change on Butterfly Species Richness/Abundance
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.54536/ajec.v5i2.7304Keywords:
Butterflies, Fritillaria, Grassland, Life History Traits, TemperatureAbstract
Butterflies are ideal model organisms to study ecological responses to environmental change, yet long-term population responses to climatic variation remain understudied. This study seeks to assess the impacts of climatic variation on butterfly populations at Porton Down, Wiltshire, United Kingdom, between 1994 and 2013. Butterfly abundance data from the Environmental Change Network were analyzed for five butterfly species: Common blue, Dark green fritillary, Green hairstreak, Small heath, and Meadow brown. Climate data (daily maximum, minimum, mean, and minimum grass temperatures; total rainfall) were obtained from Boscombe Down. Trends were analyzed visually, and Pearson correlation with linear regression assessed species-climate relationships. All five species declined between 1994 and 2013, with the Green hairstreak most threatened. Rainfall increased while temperature trends varied seasonally: daily maximum temperature increased in cold months but decreased in warm months; daily minimum and minimum grass temperatures increased in warm months but decreased in cold months. Small Heath (r = 0.48, p < 0.001) and Meadow brown (r = 0.45, p < 0.001) showed significant positive correlations with daily mean temperature. Small Heath (r = 0.32, p = 0.002), Meadow brown (r = 0.34, p = 0.005), and Green hairstreak (r = -0.32, p = 0.05) showed significant correlations with minimum grass temperature. Rainfall correlations were negative but non-significant for all species. Temperature affects butterfly species differently according to life history traits, with pupal-overwintering species most vulnerable to changing minimum temperatures. If current trends continue, butterfly abundance is expected to decline further.
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