Want to see climate change’s impact? Look at Honduras’ rare trees
Local university students measuring the large leaves of the rare Magnolia atlantida tree present in the River Cangrejal area of Pico Bonito National Park, northern Honduras. 2024. Donovan Aguirre / FUPNAPIB/ Handout via Thomson Reuters Foundation
Record heat is having a huge impact on the planet’s delicate ecosystems and poses an existential threat to biodiversity
Rich Howorth is Central America Programme Manager at Fauna & Flora
The planet is heating at a rapid rate, and the effects are being felt in all corners of the globe - from the uncontrollable wildfires currently tearing across LA to deadly flooding in Spain.
People are being impacted more severely each year. But how is climate change affecting our planet’s delicate ecosystems? And can nature and communities adapt rapidly enough?
Honduras in Central America is incredibly biodiverse. It is also one of the worst impacted countries by climate change. Local scientists have been investigating what this means for species and habitats - and the people that rely on them.
A new study, published this week by Fauna & Flora, our partners Fundación Parque Nacional Pico Bonito (FUPNAPIB) and local scientist, Pablo González-Xiloj, explores how rising temperatures and changing rainfall levels could drastically impact threatened trees species in Honduras’ largest national park, Pico Bonito.
Pico Bonito is an important link in the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor - a natural land bridge from South to North America which is crucial for migratory species such as jaguars and tapir. The area contains a huge variety of flora and fauna, including 1,233 plants recorded from the evergreen tropical rainforest zone alone.
As a result of its immensely rich biodiversity, Pico Bonito also supplies water to the extensive surrounding human populations that number almost half a million people.
The study analysed projections for temperature and precipitation levels by 2100, and showed that two tree species in Pico Bonito, both already vulnerable to extinction - Dendropanax hondurensis and Magnolia atlantida - could be dramatically displaced and almost completely lost from the park.
As the set of elements that the trees’ need to thrive and survive narrows, their long-term survival prospects are severely diminished. This is not just bad news for the trees, but for the hundreds of other species that depend on this habitat. While some trees will suffer, others that are more suited to drier, warmer conditions will dominate – resulting in a dramatic reshaping of the park.
These tree species are crucial reference points for the future of biodiversity across Pico Bonito National Park and beyond. They respond to the changes in their environment, but unlike animals they can’t ‘up sticks’ and move away.
Warm light baths the forest in Pico Bonito National Park at sunset, Honduras. 2005. Juan Pablo Moreiras / Fauna & Flora / Handout via Thomson Reuters Foundation
Warm light baths the forest in Pico Bonito National Park at sunset, Honduras. 2005. Juan Pablo Moreiras / Fauna & Flora / Handout via Thomson Reuters Foundation
Therefore, their projected decline could indicate the approaching of a tipping point in the ecosystem. This can provide an early warning sign for what's to come for the wider landscape, and a signal for how we might best target conservation efforts.
Climate change is just one of several threats to Honduras’ vulnerable species. Deforestation, agricultural expansion and illegal timber extraction are all issues that Fauna & Flora and our local partners are working to address.
If these drivers continue unabated, the ecosystem risks collapse, resulting in dire consequences for watershed protection and water supply, as well as carbon sequestration and storage - vital in the fight against climate change.
Our study provides a small but significant window into how the world could be altered if we continue down the path we’re on.
Tropical forests like those in Pico Bonito are vitally important for the megadiversity that they host and the global benefits they bestow, acting as the living lungs and ‘thermostat’ for the whole planet in regulating temperatures.
If we are to give them a fighting chance of survival, we need to invest now in their protection. That includes restoring connectivity between fragmented forests, so that species can move to more favourable areas in response to the changing climate.
Nature is our greatest ally in the struggle to tackle climate change. We need to decarbonise our world by urgently reducing fossil fuel emissions, but we also need to conserve threatened tree species and their forest ecosystems - to save not just individual species, but all life on this rapidly heating planet.
Any views expressed in this opinion piece are those of the author and not of Context or the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
Tags
- Adaptation
- Loss and damage
- Forests
- Biodiversity
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