Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Potential invasion range of raccoon in Iran under climate change

  • Original Article
  • Published:
European Journal of Wildlife Research Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Growing global evidence demonstrates that not only the invasion of alien species has imposed serious threats to native biodiversity, but it also threatens health and economics. The raccoon (Procyon lotor), medium-sized mammal, native to North America, as a result of escapes or deliberate introductions in the mid-twentieth century, is now distributed across much of mainland Europe and the Caucasus and known as an alien invasive species. The raccoon was observed and reported for the first time in 1991 in the Caspian Hyrcanian mixed forests ecoregion in Iran, near the border of Azerbaijan. Although it has been almost three decades since the first report in the northwest of the country, there are not many official reports nor scientific research on its dispersal and adaptive behaviour. In this study, we provide new evidence on the current distribution range and predict the potential distribution range and thus invasion risk of the raccoon under climate change in Iran. We trained an ensemble of species distribution models trained in native and European invaded range and transferred it over space and time to Iran in 6 future climate scenarios. We also calculated the potential dispersal range of the raccoon per year and explored potential invasion corridors. Our results show that the raccoon inclined to expand in the forests and rangelands near the Caspian Sea and toward west Iran. Our work provides evidence to conservationists and decision-makers to further focus on the areas where the species will most likely expand, under the future scenarios of the climate change in 2050.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Aliev FF, Sanderson GC (1966) Distribution and status of the raccoon in the Soviet Union. J Wildl Manage 30(3):497–502

  • Animal Rights Watch (2015) Trading the raccoon in petshops and sidewalks in Iran. <http://arw.ir/?p=62614>. Accessed 30 June 2019

  • Araújo MB, New M (2007) Ensemble forecasting of species distributions. Trends Ecol Evol 22:42–47

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Armstrong JS, Collopy F (1992) Error measures for generalizing about forecasting methods: empirical comparisons. Int J Forecast 8:69–80

    Google Scholar 

  • Bartoszewicz M, Okarma H, Zalewski A, Szczesna J (2008) Ecology of the raccoon (Procyon lotor) from western Poland. Ann Zool Fennici 45:291–298

    Google Scholar 

  • Beltrán-Beck B, García FJ, Gortázar C (2012) Raccoons in Europe: disease hazards due to the establishment of an invasive species. Eur J Wildl Res 58:5–15

    Google Scholar 

  • Biedrzycka A, Zalewski A, Bartoszewicz M, Okarma H, Jędrzejewska E (2014) The genetic structure of raccoon introduced in Central Europe reflects multiple invasion pathways. Biol Invasions 16:1611–1625

    Google Scholar 

  • Bivand R, Lewin-Koh N (2013) maptools: Tools for reading and handling spatial objects. R package version 0.8, 23, Chicago

  • Blackburn GA, Steele CM (1999) Towards the remote sensing of matorral vegetation physiology: relationships between spectral reflectance, pigment, and biophysical characteristics of semiarid bushland canopies. Remote Sens Environ 70:278–292

    Google Scholar 

  • Breiman L (2001) Random forests. Mach Learn 45:5–32

    Google Scholar 

  • Canova L, Rossi S (2009) First records of the northern raccoon Procyon lotor in Italy. Hystrix It J Mamm 19(2). https://doi.org/10.4404/HYSTRIX-19.2-4428

  • Catford JA, Daehler CC, Murphy HT, Sheppard AW, Hardesty BD, Westcott DA, Rejmánek M, Bellingham PJ, Pergl J, Horvitz CC, Hulme PE (2012) The intermediate disturbance hypothesis and plant invasions: implications for species richness and management. Perspect Plant Ecol Evol Syst 14:231–241

    Google Scholar 

  • DAISIE (2008) European invasive alien species gateway. http://www.europealiens.org/. Accessed 29 June 2019

  • Dornelas M, Gotelli NJ, McGill B, Shimadzu H, Moyes F, Sievers C, Magurran AE (2014) Assemblage time series reveal biodiversity change but not systematic loss. Science 344(6181):296–299

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Drake JM, Randin C, Guisan A (2006) Modelling ecological niches with support vector machines. J Appl Ecol 43:424–432

    Google Scholar 

  • Duscher T, Zeveloff SI, Michler FU, Nopp-Mayr U (2018) Environmental drivers of raccoon (Procyon lotor L.) occurrences in Austria–established versus newly invaded regions. Arch Biol Sci 70:41–53

    Google Scholar 

  • Elith J, Anderson PR, Dudík M et al (2006) Novel methods improve prediction of species’ distributions from occurrence data. Ecography 29:129–151

    Google Scholar 

  • Farashi A, Naderi M (2017) Predicting invasion risk of raccoon Procyon lotor in Iran using environmental niche models. Landsc Ecol Eng 13:229–236

    Google Scholar 

  • Farashi A, Kaboli M, Karami M (2013) Predicting range expansion of invasive raccoons in northern Iran using ENFA model at two different scales. Ecol Inform 15:96–102

    Google Scholar 

  • Fielding AH, Bell JF (1997) A review of methods for the assessment of prediction errors in conservation presence/absence models. Environ Conserv 24:38–49

    Google Scholar 

  • Fischer ML, Hochkirch A, Heddergott M, Schulze C, Anheyer-Behmenburg HE, Lang J, Michler FU, Hohmann U, Ansorge H, Hoffmann L, Klein R, Frantz AC (2015) Historical invasion records can be misleading: genetic evidence for multiple introductions of invasive raccoons (Procyon lotor) in Germany. PLoS One 10(5):e0125441

    PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Frantz AC, Cyriacks P, Schley L (2005) Spatial behaviour of a female raccoon (Procyon lotor) at the edge of the species’ European distribution range. Eur J Wildl Res 51:126–130

    Google Scholar 

  • Friedman JH (2001) Greedy function approximation: a gradient boosting machine. Ann Stat 29:1189–1232

    Google Scholar 

  • GBIF.org (15 August 2020a) GBIF Occurrence Download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.j7jhry

  • GBIF.org (15 August 2020b) GBIF Occurrence Download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.9ezd5f

  • Groom MJ, Meffe GK, Carroll CR, Andelman SJ (2006) Principles of conservation biology (No. Sirsi) i9780878935185). Sinauer Associates, Sunderland

  • Hair JF Jr, Anderson RE, Tatham RL, Black WC (1995) Multivariate data analysis, 3rd eds. Macmillan, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Hasties TJ, Tibshirani RJ (1990) Generalized additive models. Taylor & Francis, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Hellmann JJ, Byers JE, Bierwagen BG, Dukes JS (2008) Five potential consequences of climate change for invasive species. Conserv Biol 22:534–543

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Hijmans RJ, Cameron SE, Parra JL, Jones PG, Jarvis A (2005) Very high resolution interpolated climate surfaces for global land areas. Int J Climatol: A J Roy Meteorol Soc 25:1965–1978

    Google Scholar 

  • Hijmans RJ, Phillips S, Leathwick J, Elith J (2013) dismo: Species distribution modeling. R package version 0.8-17. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna

  • Hijmans RJ, Etten JV, Cheng J, Mattiuzzi M, Sumner M, Greenberg JA et al (2015) Package ‘raster’. https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/raster/raster.pdf. Accessed 1 June 2019

  • Hosmer DW, Lemeshow S (2000) Applied logistic regression, 2nd edn. John Wiley & Sons, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Ikeda T, Asano M, Matoba Y, Abe G (2004) Present status of invasive alien raccoon and its impact in Japan. Glob Environ Res 8:125–131

    Google Scholar 

  • Karami M, Ghadirian T, Faizolahi K (2016) The atlas of the mammals of Iran. Iran Department of the Environment, Tehran

  • Kaufmann JH (1982) Raccoons and allies. In: Feldhamer GA, Thompson BC, Chapman JA (eds) Wild mammals of North America: biology, management, and conservation. Johns Hopkins, Baltimore, pp 567–585

    Google Scholar 

  • Kauhala K (1996) Introduced carnivores in Europe with special reference to central and northern Europe. Wildlife Biol 2:197–204

    Google Scholar 

  • Khosravifard S (2007) Archiving the raccoon’s dossier. Hamshahri website. <http://images.hamshahrionline.ir/hamnews/1384/840214/irshahr/zest.htm>. Accessed 20 April 2019

  • Liu C, White M, Newell G (2013) Selecting thresholds for the prediction of species occurrence with presence-only data. J Biogeogr 40:778–789

    Google Scholar 

  • McCullagh P, Nelder JA (1989) Generalized linear models. Chapman & Hall, Boca Raton

    Google Scholar 

  • Menard S (2002) Applied logistic regression analysis. Vol. 106. Sage, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Merow C, Smith MJ, Edwards TC Jr, Guisan A, McMahon SM, Normand S, Thuiller W, Wüest RO, Zimmermann NE, Elith J (2014) What do we gain from simplicity versus complexity in species distribution models? Ecography 37:1267–1281

    Google Scholar 

  • Michler FU, Hohmann U (2005) Investigations on the ethological adaptations of the raccoon (Procyon lotor L., 1758) in the urban habitat using the example of the city of Kassel, North Hessen (Germany), and the resulting conclusions for conflict management. In: XXVII IUGB-CONGRESS, Hannover, p 417

  • Miller ME, Hui SL, Tierney WM (1991) Validation techniques for logistic regression models. Stat Med 10:1213–1226

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Mori E, Mazza G, Menchetti M, Panzeri M, Gager Y, Bertolino S, Di Febbraro M (2015) The masked invader strikes again: the conquest of Italy by the Northern raccoon. Hystrix It J Mamm 26(1):47–51

  • Naimi B (2015) Usdm: uncertainty analysis for species distribution models. R package version 1.1-15. R Doc. http://www.rdocu-mentation.org/packages/usdm. Accessed 1 June 2019

  • Naimi B, Araújo MB (2016) sdm: a reproducible and extensible R platform for species distribution modelling. Ecography 39:368–375

    Google Scholar 

  • Pearce J, Ferrier S (2000) An evaluation of alternative algorithms for fitting species distribution models using logistic regression. Ecol Model 128:127–147

    Google Scholar 

  • Pebesma E, Bivand RS (2005) Classes and methods for spatial data in R. R news 5:9–13

    Google Scholar 

  • Phillips SJ, Anderson RP, Schapire RE (2006) Maximum entropy modeling of species geographic distributions. Ecol Model 190:231–259

    Google Scholar 

  • Pyšek P, Richardson DM (2010) Invasive species, environmental change and management, and health. Annu Rev Environ Resour 35:25–55

    Google Scholar 

  • Qian H, Ricklefs RE (2006) The role of exotic species in homogenizing the North American flora. Ecol Lett 9:1293–1298

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • R Core Team (2018) R: A language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna. https://www.R-project.org/

  • Salgado I (2018) Is the raccoon (Procyon lotor) out of control in Europe? Biodivers Conserv 27:2243–2256

    Google Scholar 

  • Sanderson GC (1987) Raccoon. In: Novak M, Baker JA, Obbard ME, Malloch B (eds) Wild furbearer management and conservation in North America. Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, Toronto, pp 487–499

    Google Scholar 

  • Santini L, Di Marco M, Visconti P et al (2013) Ecological correlates of dispersal distance in terrestrial mammals. Hystrix. 24(2):181–186

    Google Scholar 

  • Scalera R, Genovesi P, Essl F, Rabitsch W (2012) The impacts of invasive alien species in Europe. Eur Environ Agency Tech Rep 16:114

    Google Scholar 

  • Seebens H, Gastner MT, Blasius B, Courchamp F (2013) The risk of marine bioinvasion caused by global shipping. Ecol Lett 16:782–790

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Seoane J, Bustamante J, Díaz-Delgado R (2005) Effect of expert opinion on the predictive ability of environmental models of bird distribution. Conserv Biol 19:512–522

    Google Scholar 

  • Sherman HB (1954) Raccoons of the Bahama-islands. J Mammal 35:126

    Google Scholar 

  • Sinkins PA, Otfinowski R (2012) Invasion or retreat? The fate of exotic invaders on the northern prairies, 40 years after cattle grazing. Plant Ecol 213:1251–1262

    Google Scholar 

  • Timm R, Cuarón AD, Reid F, Helgen K, González-Maya JF (2016) Procyon lotor. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2016: e.T41686A45216638. https://doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2016-1.RLTS.T41686A45216638.en

  • Tollington S, Turbé A, Rabitsch W, Groombridge JJ, Scalera R, Essl F, Shwartz A (2017) Making the EU legislation on invasive species a conservation success. Conserv Lett 10:112–120

    Google Scholar 

  • Usher MB (1988) Biological invasions of nature reserves: a search for generalisations. Biol Conserv 44:119–135

    Google Scholar 

  • Vandekerkhove J, Cardoso AC, Boon PJ (2013) Is there a need for a more explicit accounting of invasive alien species under the Water Framework Directive. Manag Biol Invasions 4:25–36

    Google Scholar 

  • Westman WE (1990) Park management of exotic plant species: problems and issues. Conserv Biol 4:251–260

    Google Scholar 

  • Zeveloff SI, Dewitte E (2002) Raccoons: a natural history. UBC Press, Toronto

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Natural Resources, Faculty of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation (ITC), University of Twente, PO BOX 217, 7500 AE, Enschede, The Netherlands

    Sam Khosravifard, Andrew K. Skidmore & Albertus G. Toxopeus

  2. Department of Environmental Science, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia

    Andrew K. Skidmore

  3. Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Institute, Frankfurt am Main, Germany

    Aidin Niamir

Authors
  1. Sam Khosravifard
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Andrew K. Skidmore
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Albertus G. Toxopeus
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Aidin Niamir
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Sam Khosravifard.

Additional information

Publisher’s note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Khosravifard, S., Skidmore, A.K., Toxopeus, A.G. et al. Potential invasion range of raccoon in Iran under climate change. Eur J Wildl Res 66, 100 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-020-01438-2

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-020-01438-2

Keywords

Search

Navigation