Invention of figures estimating changes in species composition in forest vegetation since the Last Glacial Maximum: A case study of the summit areas in Japan’s 100 most famous mountains

Abstract

Species distribution models play a crucial role in understanding shifts in vegetation composition driven by climate change, estimating the probabilities of plant species distributions. However, existing studies have concentrated on large-scale assessments of the distributions and are not well-equipped to analyze temporal changes in distribution probabilities of multiple species at specific sites. This study addresses this gap by estimating the distribution probabilities of 45 major tree species in Japan’s forested areas across four time periods: the Last Glacial Maximum, the Mid-Holocene, the present, and the future. We developed the Species Composition Change Estimation Map system, which calculates the probability of each species at specified latitude and longitude coordinates. Here, we present Species Composition Change Estimation Maps for the summit areas of Japan’s 100 most famous mountains. This system serves as a valuable tool for understanding shifts in species composition in response to climate change and for predicting future vegetation dynamics.