Photo Credit: Arvid Høidahl
Scientific Frontline: Extended "At a Glance" Summary: Conservation Planning for European Protected Areas Under Climate Change
The Core Concept: A comprehensive macroecological study maps climatic stability and landscape connectivity across nearly 79,000 European protected areas using 10 large mammal species. It evaluates how rapidly baseline temperatures shift and calculates the energetic costs for wildlife to traverse diverse topographies under high-emissions climate projections through 2070.
Key Distinction/Mechanism: Unlike traditional single-site conservation assessments that evaluate protected areas in isolation, this framework integrates climatic residence time—estimating the velocity of baseline temperature shifts—with terrain-related energetic costs, habitat suitability, and human-made movement barriers.
Origin/History: Published in Conservation Letters in 2026 by an international research team from the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv), Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, and Friedrich Schiller University Jena.
Major Frameworks/Components:
- Climatic residence time metrics comparing historical temperature baselines (1981–2010) with projected warming trends through 2070.
- Landscape connectivity modeling factoring in topographic steepness, energetic movement costs, and infrastructure barriers across 10 distinct large mammal species.
- Regional vulnerability assessments identifying contrasting adaptation challenges across European lowlands, northern biomes, and mountainous terrain.
Branches of Science: Conservation Biology, Macroecology, Landscape Ecology, Spatial Biodiversity Modeling
Future Application: Informing transnational and regional conservation strategies, prioritizing landscape permeability restoration, and designing resilient ecological corridors to facilitate species climate-tracking.
Why It Matters: Rapid global heating threatens static protected-area networks; identifying structural and climatic gaps enables planners to establish connected habitats essential for long-term biodiversity preservation.
As the climate changes, protecting wildlife increasingly depends on both the conditions within protected areas and the connections between them. A new study by the German Center for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv), the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU), and the Friedrich Schiller University Jena, published in Conservation Letters, identifies where climatic stability and opportunities for movement coincide in Europe, and where gaps could undermine conservation.
The study examines climate stability across 78,793 protected areas in Europe and assesses connectivity between 10,908 of these sites using ten large mammal species. The findings reveal geographical patterns across Europe, with mountain regions combining relatively stable climates with strong potential connectivity between protected areas.
Many western and central European lowlands, on the other hand, face both rapid climate change and limited opportunities for wildlife to move. The study also incorporated the energy animals need to cross terrain, alongside habitat suitability and movement barriers.
This allowed the researchers from the German Center for Integrative Biodiversity Research, the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, and the Friedrich Schiller University Jena to assess climatic stability alongside the potential for large mammals to move through surrounding landscapes.
"Today’s protected areas cannot be treated as fit for the future, especially when we look at the cost of movement across different terrains," explains first author Dr. Gavin Stark of iDiv and MLU.
How long will protected areas retain their temperature conditions?
To assess how long protected areas may retain their baseline temperature conditions, the researchers calculated a so-called climatic residence time. This estimates how quickly the temperatures currently found within a protected area are expected to shift, taking into account the area's size and the rate at which temperature conditions move across the landscape.
This analysis compared a historical baseline (1981–2010) with high-emissions climate projections through 2070, noting substantial regional differences. The median estimated climatic residence time across all protected areas in Germany was 0.9 years and 0.55 years in Poland, compared with 11.8 years in Portugal and 16.2 years in Greece, for example.
The incorporation of terrain-related energetic costs into the connectivity analysis allowed for a more comprehensive assessment of the potential of large mammals to move between protected areas in Europe. Steep slopes increase movement costs, while roads and other barriers can restrict passage.
Small protected areas with short climatic residence times warrant particular attention, especially where surrounding landscapes also restrict movement, according to the authors.
Different regions, different challenges
Montenegro, Albania, and Bosnia and Herzegovina generally combined longer climatic residence times with higher modeled connectivity. Several mountain systems, including the Scandinavian Mountains, the Pyrenees and Cantabrian Mountains, the Alps, the Apennines, the Dinaric-Balkan region, and the Carpathians, also combined relatively stable climatic conditions with strong potential for animal movement.
In contrast, the lowland areas of western and central Europe, including those in Germany, the United Kingdom, and Ireland, faced a dual challenge: climatic conditions were expected to change rapidly, while opportunities for animals to move through the landscape were limited.
Other regions face a different challenge. Finland, Estonia, and Latvia had relatively strong potential connectivity but were less likely to retain their current climatic conditions over time. This means that in these areas, even where animals may be able to move through the landscape, good connections alone may not ensure access to suitable future climates. For the species modeled, potential movement pathways were generally narrower and more fragmented for carnivores, while herbivore pathways were broader and more diffuse.
The findings reflect fundamental differences in Europe's landscapes. In largely flat regions, animals may need to travel much farther to find comparable climatic conditions. In mountain regions, temperatures can change considerably with elevation, allowing similar climatic conditions to occur over shorter distances.
However, mountains can only serve as potential refuges if animals can reach them, making foothills, transitional habitats, and surrounding landscapes important for connecting lowlands with higher elevations.
"Climate adaptation requires us to move beyond looking at protected areas individually. We need to plan for connected networks of habitats, identifying where existing links should be protected and where restoring landscape permeability could make a difference," says senior author Professor Henrique Pereira of MLU and iDiv.
According to the authors, the framework can help planners identify areas where existing connections should be protected, habitats restored, and movement barriers addressed, with priorities assessed locally.
Published in journal: Conservation Letters
Authors: Gavin Stark, Jeremy Dertien, Nikolaj Rauff Poulsen, Emilio Berti, Andrés Camilo Mármol Guijarro, Magali Weissgerber, Néstor Fernández, and Henrique M. Pereira
Source/Credit: Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg
Edited by: Scientific Frontline
Reference Number: cons110226_02