Animal-mediated plant niche tracking in a changing climate

Recent field and modeling studies provide evidence that animals are helping plants track their niches in a changing climate. Key methods include seed tracking (via isotopes or DNA), mapping seed deposition using animal telemetry or simulations, and niche models.Niche tracking requires (i) seed availability and animal disperser movement toward newly suitable locations to be synchronous, (ii) landscapes that enable movement toward newly suitable areas, and (iii) deposition microsites which support plant recruitment and population establishment.Niche tracking effectiveness is a framework for assessing the role of dispersers in helping plants track their climatic niches and successfully establish populations in locations newly suitable due to climate change.Plant and animal traits, together with landscape characteristics, can help predict animal-mediated niche tracking. Over half of plant species are animal-dispersed, and our understanding of how animals can help plants move in response to climate change – a process known as niche tracking – is limited, but advancing rapidly. Recent research efforts find evidence that animals are helping plants track their niches. They also identify key conditions needed for animal-mediated niche tracking to occur, including alignment of the timing of seed availability, the directionality of animal movements, and microhabitat conditions where seeds are deposited. A research framework that measures niche tracking effectiveness by considering all parts of the niche-tracking process, and links together data and models from multiple disciplines, will lead to further insight and inform actions to help ecosystems adapt to a changing world.