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Uncertainty in thermal tolerances and climatic debt

Nature Climate Change volume 2, pages 638–639 (2012)Cite this article

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Devictor et al. reply —

In their comment, Rodríguez-Sánchez et al. claim that our conclusions on the climatic debt of birds and butterflies1 are premature because introducing statistical and biological uncertainties in species-specific thermal tolerance (species temperature index, STI) would blur the temporal trend in the community temperature index CTI). Here, we show why our results are not affected by this uncertainty and further assess the STI uncertainty and its consequences.

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Figure 1: Estimating STI uncertainty and consequences on the temporal trend in CTI.

References

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Acknowledgements

We thank Cécile Albert for stimulating comments on the importance of intraspecific variability and its consequences. We also thank Francisco Rodríguez-Sánchez and colleagues for initiating this thought-provoking discussion.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institut des Sciences de l'Evolution, UMR CNRS-UM2 5554, Montpellier, 34095, France

    Vincent Devictor

  2. Dutch Butterfly Conservation, PO Box 506, Wageningen, 6700 AM, The Netherlands

    Chris van Swaay, Zdenek Vermouzek, Michiel Wallis De Vries & Irma Wynhoff

  3. Butterfly Conservation, Wareham, BH20 5QP, UK

    Tom Brereton

  4. Catalan Ornithological Institute, Barcelona, 08003, Spain

    Lluís Brotons & Sergi Herrando

  5. Centre Tecnològic Forestal de Catalunya, Solsona, 25280, Spain

    Lluís Brotons

  6. British Trust for Ornithology, Thetford, IP24 2PU, UK

    Dan Chamberlain

  7. Finnish Environment Institute, PO Box 140, Helsinki, FIN-00251, Finland

    Janne Heliölä & Mikko Kuussaari

  8. Conservation des Espèces Restauration et Suivi des Populations-MNHN, Paris, 75005, France

    Romain Julliard & Frédéric Jiguet

  9. Department of Biology, Lund University, Lund, SE-223 62, Sweden

    Åke Lindström

  10. Institute for Environmental Studies, Charles University in Prague, Praha, 128 01, 2, Czech Republic

    Jirí Reif

  11. Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Wallingford, OX10 8BB, UK

    David B. Roy

  12. Department of Community Ecology, UFZ, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Halle, D-06120, Germany

    Oliver Schweiger & Josef Settele

  13. Museu de Granollers Ciències Naturals, Granollers, E-08400, Spain

    Constantí Stefanescu

  14. Statistics Netherlands, PO Box 24500, The Hague, 2490HA, The Netherlands

    Arco Van Strien

  15. SOVON Dutch Centre for Field Ornithology, Beek-Ubbergen, 6573 DG, The Netherlands

    Chris Van Turnhout

  16. Department of Environmental Science and Department of Animal Ecology, Institute for Water and Wetland Research, Radboud University Nijmegen, PO Box 9010, Nijmegen, 6500 GL, The Netherlands

    Chris Van Turnhout

  17. Czech Society for Ornithology, 150 00, Praha, 5, Czech Republic

    Zdenek Vermouzek

  18. Laboratory of Entomology, Wageningen University, PO Box 8031, Wageningen, 6700 EH, The Netherlands

    Michiel Wallis De Vries

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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Vincent Devictor.

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Devictor, V., van Swaay, C., Brereton, T. et al. Uncertainty in thermal tolerances and climatic debt. Nature Clim Change 2, 638–639 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1668

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