The present proposal falls within the scope of Conservation Paleobiology, defined as the application of theories and analytical tools of paleontology to biodiversity conservation and the use of geohistorical records to address current problems in the conservation and restoration of biodiversity and ecosystem services (Dietl & Flessa, 2017), whose aims are closely related to some of the environmental objectives of ecological transition (Regulation 2020/852/EU), more specifically on (a) climate change mitigation; (b) climate change adaptation; and (f) the protection and restoration of biodiversity and ecosystems.
Regarding climate change mitigation, our proposal aids significantly in the “strengthening of land carbon sinks”. Similarly, it includes adaptation solutions to “prevent or reduce the risk of the adverse impact of the current climate and the expected future climate on people, nature or assets”. But the most substantial contribution of our proposal is linked to the protection and restoration of biodiversity and ecosystem. Indeed, it “contributes substantially to protecting, conserving or restoring biodiversity (…) through: a) nature and biodiversity conservation, including achieving favourable conservation status of natural and semi-natural habitats and species, or preventing their deterioration where they already have favourable conservation status, and protecting and restoring terrestrial, marine and other aquatic ecosystems in order to improve their condition and enhance their capacity to provide ecosystem services, (…) namely regulating services, (…) and (d) sustainable forest management, including practices and uses of forests and forest land that contribute to enhancing biodiversity or to halting or preventing degradation of ecosystems, deforestation and habitat loss;” To meet these environmental goals, we have improved an innovative methodology over the last ten years, entailing an integrated approach for the long-term conservation of two emblematic conifer species of the Western Mediterranean, Abies pinsapo and Cedrus atlantica, in our research line concerning Conservation Paleobiology from previous projects such as MEDRefugia, OROMedRefugia, RelicFlora and RelicFlora2. Indeed, a multidisciplinary strategy provides a wider perspective allowing the identification and establishment of an effective and resilient ecological network of suitable refugia for enduring their conservation.
These forests have undergone a steady decline during the Holocene, affected by an increasing aridity and the strengthening of human activities, a trend which will enhance in the next future. The detection of the areas where these species have persisted during the last millennia becomes a major opportunity to ensure their long-term viability. Refugia can be defined as areas harbouring relict and isolated populations thanks to specific local conditions, which diverge from the prevailing global ones. Addressing the resilience of these ecosystems becomes crucial for conservation managers. The range of variability and the recovery rate are essential components of resilience, but cannot be limited to current instrumental observations.
Past datasets spanning a long enough time can record the responses of an ecosystem to environmental perturbations, so a linkage between short and long-timescale perspectives should be necessary to a better understanding of the ecological drivers which have led Mediterranean mountain conifer forests to their current state.
To achieve our main goal: Identifying thresholds of potential (conservation) concern which may help long-term persistence of focal populations in suitable areas (refugia), providing a factual basis for ecological restoration, we propose an integrated research which includes: (1) multiproxy palaeoecological records (pollen, non-pollen palynomorphs, charcoal, geochemistry) to locate past refugia, range of natural variability, responses to disturbances and the factors involved; (2) DNA and phylogeographic studies, also to identify refugia, vegetation composition and testing phylogeographic patterns; (3) instrumental record, to establish current range of variability; (4) ecological modelling, to appoint the most susceptible refugia and assess the contribution of the diverse factors to the changes shown by the paleorecord.