Modellng climate futures

WCS Canada’s Northern Boreal Mountains Program initiated a new climate change adaptation project in collaboration with government partners to focus on the development of key species distribution models under various future climate change scenarios in Yukon. The models on endemic plants, invertebrates and other species such as caribou are projected across Yukon and can be used for wildlife conservation in land-use planning and management. So far, we have generated current and future models for 66 endemic plant species across the Yukon and Alaska and the resultant paper has been published in Diversity and Distribution.

We have also completed Phase I of the Yukon climate change adaptation web tool. Phase I is a web-based portal that will house data resulting from climate change adaptation research including those from endemic species distribution models mentioned above. All data are publicly available. We have now commenced the Phase II of the web tool, which is a data visualization, overlay and extraction tool. Phase III, which is a modelling tool will commence shortly. Collectively, these tools will enable Government partners and land-use planners to assess current and potential changes in their environments, enable plan reviews, and re-assess the ability of protected areas to support focal species.