Substitutable habitats? The biophysical and anthropogenic drivers of an exotic bird’s distribution

Abstract The spread and distribution of exotic species depends on a number of factors, both anthropogenic and biophysical. The importance of each factor may vary geographically, making it difficult to predict where a species will spread. In this paper, we examine the factors that influence the distribution of monk parakeets (Myiopsitta monachus), a parrot native to South America that has become established in the United States. We use monk parakeet observations gathered from citizen-science datasets to inform a series of random forest models that examine the relative importance of biophysical and anthropogenic variables in different regions of the United States. We find that while the distribution of monk parakeets in the southern US is best explained by biophysical variables such as January dew point temperature and forest cover, the distribution of monk parakeets in the northern US appears to be limited to urban environments. Our results suggest that monk parakeets are unlikely to spread outside of urban environments in the northern United States, as they are not adapted to the climatic conditions in that region. We extend the notion of “substitutable habitats,” previously applied to different habitats in the same landscape, to exotic species in novel landscapes (e.g., cities). These novel landscapes provide resources and environmental conditions that, although very different from the species’ native habitat, still enable them to become established. Our results highlight the importance of understanding the regionally-specific factors that allow an exotic species to become established, which is key to predicting their expansion beyond areas of introduction.

[1]  J. Lawler,et al.  Performance of habitat suitability models for the endangered black-capped vireo built with remotely-sensed data , 2012 .

[2]  Steven J. Phillips,et al.  Sample selection bias and presence-only distribution models: implications for background and pseudo-absence data. , 2009, Ecological applications : a publication of the Ecological Society of America.

[3]  R. Mathieu,et al.  Diversity of native and exotic birds across an urban gradient in a New Zealand city , 2008 .

[4]  D. Simberloff The Role of Propagule Pressure in Biological Invasions , 2009 .

[5]  Raimundo Real,et al.  Assessing the potential range expansion of the exotic monk parakeet in Spain , 2006 .

[6]  C. Lever Naturalized Birds of the World , 1988 .

[7]  Gretchen G. Moisen,et al.  Evaluating effectiveness of down-sampling for stratified designs and unbalanced prevalence in Random Forest models of tree species distributions in Nevada , 2012 .

[8]  D. Gesch,et al.  Global multi-resolution terrain elevation data 2010 (GMTED2010) , 2011 .

[9]  M. Avery,et al.  Genetic evidence links invasive monk parakeet populations in the United States to the international pet trade , 2008, BMC Evolutionary Biology.

[10]  John Maindonald,et al.  Data Analysis and Graphics Using R: An Example-based Approach (Cambridge Series in Statistical and Probabilistic Mathematics) , 2003 .

[11]  P. Moyle,et al.  Predicting Invasion Success: Freshwater Fishes in California as a Model , 2006 .

[12]  H. Pulliam,et al.  Ecological Processes That Affect Populations in Complex Landscapes , 1992 .

[13]  S. Kark,et al.  Human-related processes drive the richness of exotic birds in Europe , 2009, Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.

[14]  Wolfgang Nentwig,et al.  Disentangling the role of environmental and human pressures on biological invasions across Europe , 2010, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[15]  Brian L. Sullivan,et al.  eBird: A citizen-based bird observation network in the biological sciences , 2009 .

[16]  Caren B. Cooper,et al.  Data validation in citizen science: a case study from Project FeederWatch , 2012 .

[17]  Juan Carlos Senar,et al.  Population size of the Monk Parakeet Myiopsitta monachus in Catalonia , 2003 .

[18]  S. Blanchet,et al.  Fish Invasions in the World's River Systems: When Natural Processes Are Blurred by Human Activities , 2008, PLoS biology.

[19]  Eun Ju Lee,et al.  Responses of Two Invasive Plants Under Various Microclimate Conditions in the Seoul Metropolitan Region , 2012, Environmental Management.

[20]  Petr Pyšek,et al.  Fifty years of invasion ecology – the legacy of Charles Elton , 2008 .

[21]  C. Nilsson,et al.  Reducing redundancy in invasion ecology by integrating hypotheses into a single theoretical framework , 2009 .

[22]  K. Gaston,et al.  Garden bird feeding predicts the structure of urban avian assemblages , 2008 .

[23]  J. Murray,et al.  Predicting the potential distribution of a riparian invasive plant: the effects of changing climate, flood regimes and land‐use patterns , 2012 .

[24]  P. Hulme Trade, transport and trouble: managing invasive species pathways in an era of globalization , 2009 .

[25]  Christopher A. Barnes,et al.  Completion of the 2006 National Land Cover Database for the conterminous United States. , 2011 .

[26]  T. Oke City size and the urban heat island , 1973 .

[27]  M. McKinney,et al.  Urbanization as a major cause of biotic homogenization , 2006 .

[28]  Franz Rebele Urban Ecology and Special Features of Urban Ecosystems , 1994 .

[29]  N. Grimm,et al.  Global Change and the Ecology of Cities , 2008, Science.

[30]  H. MacIsaac,et al.  Propagule pressure: a null model for biological invasions , 2006, Biological Invasions.

[31]  Vojtech Jarosik,et al.  Separating habitat invasibility by alien plants from the actual level of invasion. , 2008, Ecology.

[32]  D. Sol,et al.  Habitat Selection by the Monk Parakeet during Colonization of a New Area in Spain , 1997 .

[33]  P. Chesson,et al.  Community ecology theory as a framework for biological invasions , 2002 .

[34]  Leo Breiman,et al.  Random Forests , 2001, Machine Learning.

[35]  J. Senar,et al.  Numbered neck collars for long‐distance identification of parakeets , 2012 .

[36]  Thomas K. Maiersperger,et al.  eMODIS: A User-Friendly Data Source , 2010 .

[37]  Á. Felicísimo,et al.  Profile or group discriminative techniques? Generating reliable species distribution models using pseudo‐absences and target‐group absences from natural history collections , 2010 .

[38]  J. C. Senar,et al.  Distribution patterns of invasive Monk parakeets (Myiopsitta monachus) in an urban habitat , 2012 .

[39]  A. Peterson Predicting the Geography of Species’ Invasions via Ecological Niche Modeling , 2003, The Quarterly Review of Biology.

[40]  D. Strayer,et al.  Invasion success of vertebrates in Europe and North America. , 2005, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[41]  H. Sukopp Human-caused impact on preserved vegetation , 2004 .

[42]  Damaris Zurell,et al.  Collinearity: a review of methods to deal with it and a simulation study evaluating their performance , 2013 .

[43]  Achim Zeileis,et al.  Bias in random forest variable importance measures: Illustrations, sources and a solution , 2007, BMC Bioinformatics.

[44]  T. Blackburn,et al.  Determinants of establishment success in introduced birds , 2001, Nature.

[45]  E. Matthysen,et al.  Establishment success of invasive ring‐necked and monk parakeets in Europe , 2009 .

[46]  A. S. Griffin,et al.  The paradox of invasion in birds: competitive superiority or ecological opportunism? , 2011, Oecologia.

[47]  S. Newson,et al.  Enhanced niche opportunities: can they explain the success of New Zealand's introduced bird species? , 2009 .

[48]  Stephen Pruett-Jones,et al.  NATURAL HISTORY OF THE MONK PARAKEET IN HYDE PARK, CHICAGO , 1995 .

[49]  T. D. Mitchell,et al.  An improved method of constructing a database of monthly climate observations and associated high‐resolution grids , 2005 .

[50]  D. Richardson,et al.  Interactions between environment, species traits, and human uses describe patterns of plant invasions. , 2006, Ecology.

[51]  A. Arnfield Two decades of urban climate research: a review of turbulence, exchanges of energy and water, and the urban heat island , 2003 .

[52]  David Tilman,et al.  Niche tradeoffs, neutrality, and community structure: a stochastic theory of resource competition, invasion, and community assembly. , 2004, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[53]  Stephen Pruett-Jones,et al.  PATTERNS OF FLOCK SIZE, DIET, AND VIGILANCE OF NATURALIZED MONK PARAKEETS IN HYDE PARK, CHICAGO , 2000 .

[54]  Christopher A. Lepczyk,et al.  Assessing Landowner Activities Related to Birds Across Rural-to-Urban Landscapes , 2004, Environmental management.

[55]  Patrick J. McIntyre,et al.  Evolution and Ecology of Species Range Limits , 2009 .

[56]  E. Minor,et al.  Distribution of exotic monk parakeets across an urban landscape , 2012, Urban Ecosystems.

[57]  Andy Liaw,et al.  Classification and Regression by randomForest , 2007 .

[58]  P. Adler,et al.  A meta‐analysis of biotic resistance to exotic plant invasions , 2004 .

[59]  S. Manel,et al.  Evaluating presence-absence models in ecology: the need to account for prevalence , 2001 .

[60]  Berton H. Gunter,et al.  Data Analysis and Graphics Using R: An Example-Based Approach , 2004, Technometrics.

[61]  Cang Hui,et al.  Relative roles of climatic suitability and anthropogenic influence in determining the pattern of spread in a global invader , 2010, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[62]  Stephen Pruett-Jones,et al.  Exponential Population Growth of Monk Parakeets in the United States , 1996 .

[63]  David N. Bonter,et al.  Citizen Science as an Ecological Research Tool: Challenges and Benefits , 2010 .

[64]  Bram Van Moorter,et al.  Landscape composition influences roe deer habitat selection at both home range and landscape scales , 2011, Landscape Ecology.

[65]  Anders Pape Møller,et al.  Successful city dwellers: a comparative study of the ecological characteristics of urban birds in the Western Palearctic , 2009, Oecologia.

[66]  S. Barry,et al.  Predicting establishment success for alien reptiles and amphibians: a role for climate matching , 2009, Biological Invasions.

[67]  P. Yaukey Citizen Science and Bird–Distribution Data: AN Opportunity for Geographical Research* , 2010 .

[68]  Rebecca E. Irwin,et al.  Linking economic activities to the distribution of exotic plants. , 2004, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[69]  D. R. Cutler,et al.  Utah State University From the SelectedWorks of , 2017 .

[70]  Steve Kelling,et al.  A method for measuring the relative information content of data from different monitoring protocols , 2010 .

[71]  D. Richardson,et al.  Niche‐based modelling as a tool for predicting the risk of alien plant invasions at a global scale , 2005, Global change biology.

[72]  J. Forshaw Parrots of the World , 1973 .

[73]  M. Leibold,et al.  Urban parakeets in Northern Illinois: A 40-year perspective , 2012, Urban Ecosystems.