[MUSIC] Well, we still have one outstanding question. That is the hot spots of endemism. As explained before, large-scale diversity patterns correlate well with past and current climate. But the land climate does not fully explain the localities of areas with large accumulation of small range species, those with very small distribution. Many of these are in mountains. There are high opportunities for speciation in the mountains because of the many barriers. But species can also persist in situ in the location because they can move up and down the elevational gradient and in that way track climate change over time. Obviously local differentiation and speciation is possible because unlike in flat terrain, where species may have to move thousands of kilometers to keep track of climate change. They can here survive by simply moving a few hundred meters up and down the slope. Just if glaciers expand in the highest mountain, the species just move deeper down to seek shelter down in the mountain valleys. And overall this gives increased opportunity for specialization to local conditions, so that species can evolve locally. However, not all mountane areas have endemic species. In the high north for instance, or in the interior of continents, most mountane areas are just biologically impoverished - like an extension of the Arctic. Ocean climates and sea breezes and monsoons interacting with the topography of mountane areas could be an alternative explanation to what, or what controls biological diversity on land. Zhiheng Wang, a postdoc at our center used global distribution data for 20,368 species of mammals, birds and amphibians to define centers of extraordinary endemism that we see here in this map. The dark red are places where birds, mammals, and amphibians all have more small-range species than we statistically should expect by from comparison with a null model that takes all other variables into account. We can see that many of the centers of extraordinary endemism are in the mountane regions, which is the darkest green color on the map. 78% of the area units with extraordinary endemism include mountain environment. And 76% of them are within 300 kilometers from coasts. Compared with 25% and 15.6% respectively of the Earth's land surface. So, is there a more general explanation than just the climate change velocity index? Let us compare now, with the results of the paleoclimate model. This map shows the change since the last glacial maximum until today. And with different color tunes, the palest purplish color actively shows areas where the temperature did not change. Ocean surfaces are generally more stable than the adjacent land. Well, this is simply because of processes to heat up and to cool down water are much slower while just with small changes in solar insolation, terrestrial climate changes rapidly. The ocean maintains the same surface temperature for long periods of time, because of the circulation systems in the ocean. We can see that from the map that, especially the tropical and the Austral seas included, are very stable. Especially coasts with so-called Eastern boundary currents like for instance at the African Cape and the Namib coasts and the coast of Chile. These are cold sea currents, but they are thermally stable. The temperature is the same all the time. Statistically thermal stability over the ocean within 300 kilometers off the coast is the very best explanation for where we find areas with extraordinary endemism. It is better than the climate data for the individual grid cells on the map. The zone within 300 kilometers from coast is typically where we find cloud formation or other mist dependent vegetation in the mountains, and this is probably per CE a very important factor. We can see clouds are down in the valleys, here in the background, and inside this cloud zone we often have very specially mossy forest habitats, which is a very important habitat for many of the endemic species. Indeed ocean air temperature stability during the last Quaternary, the glacial period, were found to be the very best predictor of the centers of endemism. Inland centers of endemism are located almost exclusively in mountains, while about 20% of centers of endemism in the coastal belt are also in non-mountain areas. The centers of endemism also correspond very well to human population centers in the coastal zone and this exacerbates the risk of human impact on biological diversity. This is, some research results that emphasize the need to better understand the mechanism of interaction between ocean climate and terrestrial centers of endemism for better predicting how terrestrial biological diversity will change at the global change. One other, one interesting hotspot is the Udzungwa Mountains in the Eastern Arc Mountain Range in Tanzania. This mountain slope here on this photo is 200 km inland, but facing right towards the Indian Ocean and received humid air all the time up through the last many million years. And pollen drill cores up on the top of a highland here show constant conditions during the last glacial period. The Zoological Museum here has been collecting birds in this area for many years, looking at differentiation of local species. These sun birds here look very similar, but there are strong genetic differences between them. And they know themselves that they are different species and compete fiercely replacing each other in different parts of the highland. We even have species here that still does not have a formal name, a new discovered species. And interestingly in an area like this, we not only have fairly recently evolved species like this, but we also have some ancient species. This gallinaceous bird discovered some twenty years ago, the Udzungwa forest partridge, has no relatives in Africa. Its nearest relatives are in Southeast Asia. It is a relic from sometime 40 million years back in time. And it is found only in three forest patches, up in the Udzungwa highland. In the same area were also found, this one which is a new described species of sangi or elephant shrew. It is new discovered and probably lives only in a couple of forest patches, up in this highland. And this is also an ancient species. Some areas with high endemism can also be found deeper into the continents. But even here, stable local climates may be the best predictor of endemism. Here we are on the Eastern slope of the Andes in Bolivia. It is far from the ocean. Still, conditions may be very predictable in some mountain basins on the transition between the large highland areas and the lowland savannas to the east. Look at this picture. This is a tremendous elevational gradient in the Cocapata area in Bolivia, 2000 meters high from the bottom, with deciduous forest and cactus terrain up to the alpine habitat at the top ridge at 4000 meters elevation. The mid elevation is mostly cultivated, with maize fields and some villages, since this area always had a benign climate, with sun and adequate rainfall from the high parts of the mountain. The local people conserve some forest patches here and there to have timber resources, and to secure water for irrigation. But although only few percent of the vegetation remain in a natural state, this area had a remarkable species diversity, including several species with very limited distributions, actually. We found a number of new species in this area, plants and birds. Some lowland species might move high up in the valley here. On the other side of the ridge you can see the close dense clouds coming over the mountains. On the Yngas slope we have impenetrable mountane rainforest. Absolutely no people and a predominance of widespread species. In winter, the area east of the Andes here is impacted by frequent intervals of south polar winds that cause disgusting conditions, strong wind, rain, and freezing condition in the mountane forest. No people will settle here. And even the avifauna is impoverished, with mountane species migrating to lower elevations in the winter period. High populations persistence in centers of endemism allow evolution of co-adapted communities under these conditions. Hummingbirds and plants become closely connected. And as you can see in this graph here on the horizontal axis we have a scoring of endemism on the vertical axis we see connectance between hummingbirds and their plants. Each dot represents one local community from different parts of the Neotropics. What we see here is, oh I should say that the high score of connectance means that all the hummingbirds in this community visit many different plants and all the different plants are visited by many different hummingbirds. So, we can see that in area with low endemism, hummingbirds use a lot of different plants. In areas with high endemism, they are actually associated with just a few plants. So this shows a very clear tendency for specialization in these areas where conditions remain stable for very long periods of time. Here is the map of the whole Andes region of Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia in 15 minute spatial resolution. The colors here show number of species representing the 25% of South American bird species with the smallest distributions. So this is our aggregates of endemism. We can see that these are very closely associated with the Andes region and the Pacific coastal regions, with very few of them in the Amazon lowlands to the east, to the right of the Andes. The red peak value up in Ecuador is 220 species together in one such grid cell. Note the amount of local aggregation. Endemic species are concentrated in very small areas. The arrow here points to the Cocapata Valley that we saw on the earlier photograph where we had the Molle culture center during some 100 years ago. The black outlines on the map show the pre-Colombian population centers, so where people lived in the Andes. Where high cultures evolved over centuries or millenia. Apparently people liked endemic birds. They are concentrated in exactly the same areas. Maybe we can conclude that the environmental conditions that favored evolution of endemic birds over millions of years, also offered the benign climate and stable water supply that was essential for development of intensive agriculture. So what can we learn from this? First of all, there is a clear message for conservation. If we really want to conserve species and maintain the potential for continuous diversification and evolution of new species, it is not enough to conserve some pristine wilderness area with no people such as the wet mountain slope in the clouds in the background of the photo you saw a while ago. What is needed is actually resources for sustainable management, sustainable development in area with people. Such as the Cocapata valley that you saw on the picture. They should be encouraged to maintain a land use system that, where forest patches are conserved or managed in a sustainable way, as water catchment areas and sources for, forest products. So this is an important message for conservation everywhere in the world. You actually need to take into account that people very often like the area that is most important for biodiversity. [MUSIC]
