Distribution modeling of the main forest tree species under climate change in West Mediterranean

Climate change has been expressed as a process with dramatic consequences on ecosystems in recent years. Especially the changes in the distribution of living communities draw attention. Considering this fact, it is aimed to predict the possible future changes of the distribution of black pine, brutian pine and taurus cedar species in the west of the Western Mediterranean Basin. The sustainable use of the mentioned species is important because of their wide distribution and high economic demands. It is necessary to know the ecological properties of these species and their responses to the climate crisis to ensure their sustainability. The MaxEnt method was employed to determine the ecological requirements of the species and model their distribution in current and future climatic conditions. Further, the importance values of the species were calculated and modeled using the random forest method in terms of current and future climatic conditions. Climate data was obtained from the CHELSA. As a result of the MaxEnt modeling, the AUC values for black pine, brutian pine and taurus cedar species were determined as 0.881, 0.806 and 0.902, respectively. The r2 values of the importance value were determined as 0.34, 0.21 and 0.59, respectively. It has been concluded that the distribution of brutian pine will increase according to the SSP1 2.6 and SSP3 7.0 scenarios and partially decrease for SSP5 8.5. It is thought that the results obtained will provide practical and effective benefits to the planning in terms of forestry studies to be performed in the region.