Maxent modelling for predicting climate change effects on the potential planting area of tuber mustard in China

Abstract

Potential planting area for tuber mustard was simulated using the Maxent model under current and future conditions based on 591 coordinates and 22 environmental layers. Model accuracy was excellent, with area under the receiving operator curve values of 0.967 and 0.958 for model training and testing, respectively. Dominant factors were mean diurnal range, mean temperature of the coldest quarter, annual mean temperature and minimum temperature of the coldest month, with thresholds of 6.5-7.5, 5.5-9, 16-19 and 2.0-6.5 °C, respectively. Under current conditions, suitable habitat areas (2.16% of total land in China) were concentrated mainly in Central, Southwest and East China, which can be defined as three occurrence and diffusion centres. In the 2050s and 2070s, suitable habitat areas are predicted to change to 3.72 and 3.92%, and 3.60 and 3.73% under scenarios RCP4.5 and RCP6.0, respectively, indicating that suitable habitat areas will increase slightly. However, future distribution of tuber mustard was predicted to differ among provinces or cities, i.e. predicted suitable habitat areas in Sichuan Province increased up to the 2050s but remained relatively unchanged between the 2050s and 2070s; in Chongqing city they first increased and then decreased; in Hunan, Anhui, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Fujian Provinces they increased continuously; and in Guizhou, Hubei, Jiangxi Provinces and Shanghai city they first decreased, and then increased. The results from the current study provide useful information for management decisions of tuber mustard.