Climate-Based Predictions of Forest Biodiversity using Smithsonian's Global Earth Observing Network

The conceptual relationship between temperature and forest family diversity has been developed by Rochefort and Woodward (1992) and is a useful concept to detect, examine and calibrate the climate-biodiversity relationship. The conceptual model assumes that the primary mechanisms that determine diversity include the capacity to survive the absolute minimum temperature of a site, and the ability to complete the life cycle in a given length and warmth of a growing season. This study presents the actual data, based on earth observing sites, as an effective diagnostic tool to identify areas where the biodiversity is or is not in equilibrium with the present climate, as well as developing the basis for predictions under climate change. This observing network is based on data from monitoring plots established in Canada using protocols from the Smithsonian Institution's Measuring and Assessing Biodiversity (SI/MAB) program, as well as growing-degree data derived from climate observing sites.