Large Variability In Response To Projected Climate And Land-Use Changes Among European Bumblebee Species

Bumblebees (Bombus ssp.) are among the most important wild pollinators, but many species have suffered from range declines. Land-use change, agricultural intensification, and the associated loss of habitat have been identified as drivers of the observed dynamics, amplifying pressures from a changing climate. However, these drivers are still underrepresented in continental-scale species distribution modeling. Here, we project the potential distribution of 47 European bumblebee species in 2050 and 2080 from existing European-scale distribution maps, based on a set of climate and land-use futures simulated through a regional integrated assessment model and consistent with the RCP-SSP scenario framework. We compare projections including (1) dynamic climate and constant land use (CLIM); (2) constant climate and dynamic land use (LU); and (3) dynamic climate and dynamic land use (COMB) to disentangle the effects of land use and climate change on future habitat suitability, providing the first rigorous continental-scale assessment of linked climate-land-use futures for bumblebees. We find that direct climate impacts, although variable across species, dominate responses for most species, especially under high-end climate change scenarios (up to 99% range loss). Land-use impacts are highly variable across species and scenarios, ranging from severe losses (up to 75% loss) to considerable gains (up to 68% gain) of suitable habitat extent. Rare species thereby tend to be disproportionally affected by both climate and land-use change. COMB projections reveal that land use may amplify, attenuate, or offset changes to suitable habitat extent expected from climate impact depending on species and scenario. Especially in low-end climate change scenarios, land use has the potential to become a game changer in determining the direction and magnitude of range changes, indicating substantial potential for targeted conservation management.