Global Environmental Change and Biodiversity Workshop

Dourdan, France, 1-4 May 2005

 

 

Sunday, May 1 - Arrival of participants

 

Monday, May 2 - Summary of current knowledge

Oral presentations in plenary session

 

8:00-9:00 Registration

 

9:00 Introductory comments on goals of workshop - P. Leadley and comments from the organizing committee: J. Morgan, I.C. Prentice, L. Rustad & A. Watkinson

9:10 Brief summary of previous Global Change and Biodiversity meetings - A. Watkinson

9:20 Introduction of participants - a few introductory words from each participant

9:45 Presentation of DIVERSITAS (A. Larigauderie, J.P.  Rodriguez), TERACC (L. Rustad), and the Global Land Project (D. Ojima)

 

10:15 Effects of CO2, temperature, N and precipitation on plant and soil organism diversity in patch scale experiments.

(Syntheses of current knowledge - 20 min each)

Effects of elevated CO2 on plant and soil community structure - Ch Körner

Effects of elevated temperature on ecosystem structure and function - L. Rustad

 

10:55 Coffee break

 

11:10 (cont.)

Effects of nitrogen deposition on plant community structure - F. Berendse

Interactions between multiple environmental changes - E. Zavaleta

 

11:50 Gap-dynamic and patch-scale models of vegetation response to global env. change

(Underlying drivers, key hypotheses & simplifying assumptions, predictions - 20 min each)

Modeling forest community dynamics as affected by global change - H. Bugmann

Modeling the effects of global change on shrublands and grasslands - J. Reynolds

 

12:30 Lunch and stroll around the grounds

 

14:00 Bioclimatic models of plant and animal species responses to environmental change

(Underlying drivers, key hypotheses & simplifying assumptions, predictions - 20 min each)

Bioclimatic models for European plant and animal species - W. Thullier

Bioclimatic models for South African fynbos - G. Midgley

Bioclimatic models for insect distributions - R. Sutherst

 

15:00 Coffee break

 

15:15 Biome and plant functional type responses to as predicted by global vegetation models

(Underlying drivers, key hypotheses & simplifying assumptions, predictions - special emphasis on physiological response and competition - 20 min each)

MAPSS model - D. Bachelet 

LPJ model - I.C. Prentice

Sheffield model - B. Bond

 

16:15 Observations of shifts in species range or phenology (20 min each)

Evidence for range shifts in plants - J. Penuelas

Evidence for range shifts in animals - C. Parmesan

Evidence for shifts in plant phenology - T. Sparks

 

17:15 Conveying the biodiversity message to decision makers in the larger context of climate change - A. Watkinson.

 

17:30 - 18:00  Plenary discussion and planning for day 2

 

19:00 Dinner

 

 

Tuesday, May 3 - Challenges: burning issues that need to be addressed to improve confidence in our ability to predict the effects of global environmental change on biodiversity

 

Morning - Short presentations (5-10 mins) and discussion in plenary session.

 

8:15 - 9:15  Can bioclimatic models be compared with observed changes in species ranges?  Are there data sets and models that are well adapted for making this kind of comparison?

 

Discussion leader - R. Sutherst

 

9:15 - 10:15 Are diversity responses to environmental change comparable in experimental systems and in models?  How can we incorporate our understanding of the mechanisms of response to vegetation to multiple environmental changes in the next generation of models?

 

Discussion leader - P. Leadley

Comments on including additional mechanism in bioclimatic models - S. Schaeffer

Comparing experiments and models for vegetation change in S. Africa - G. Midgley

Comparing experiments and models for prairie vegetation - J. Morgan

 

 

10:15 Coffee break

 

10:30 - 11:30 How fast can species move? Dispersal limits and interactions with land use.  Are dispersal rates likely to be too slow to keep up with environmental change?  Is it a reasonable objective to include dispersal in models of species response to environmental change?

 

Discussion leader - J. Clark

Paleological perspectives on dispersion - S. Higgins / J. Clark

Importance/treatment of dispersal in models - S. Lavorel, H. Bugmann, G. Midley

 

11:30 - 12:30 How can we separate climate change effects from other natural and human induced (e.g., land use) shifts in plant and animal ranges?  How should earth observation systems be designed to detect biodiversity responses to environmental change?

 

Discussion leader - R. Green

 

12:30  Lunch and stroll around the grounds

 

Afternoon - Additional burning issues and/or breakoutgroups

 

Possible additional topics

Designing the next generation of global change experiments.  How can we best refine our understanding of the mechanisms of diversity response?  What are the best means to study multiple interactions? - Discussion leader: L. Rustad

• etc...

 

The role of breakout groups is to further identify key issues that need to be resolved and discuss concrete means of addressing these issues through collaborative work. Breakout group topics may correspond to discussion topics in the morning.

 

 

Wednesday, May 4 - Perspectives - Discussion and breakout groups

 

8:15 - 10:30  Continued work in breakout groups

 

10:30 Coffee break

 

10:45 - 11:30 Reports from breakout groups in plenary session

 

11:30 - 12:30  Plenary discussion

 

Is there a coherent message about the effects of global change on biodiversity that emerges from comparing a variety of experiments, models and observations?  Is this message strong enough to merit writing a journal article?

 

What kinds of challenges can be reasonably taken on in the near future?  How would this be best accomplished?  What will the role of the GLP, DIVERSITAS and TERACC be?

 

What should the long-term goals be? 

 

12:30 Closing remarks by the organizers

 

12:45 - Lunch