Northern Cerrado Native Vegetation is a Refuge for Birds Under Current Climate Change

Climate Change is already seen as one of the biggest threats to biodiversity in the 21st century. Not much studies direct attention to its effects on whole communities of threatened hotspots. In the present work, we combine ecological niche modelling (ENM) with a future climate scenario of greenhouse gases emissions to study the future changes in alpha and beta diversity of birds of the Brazilian Cerrado biome, a hotspot of biodiversity with high velocity of climate change and agricultural expansion. In general, we found heterogeneous results for changes in species richness, spatial and temporal taxonomic and functional beta diversity, and mean ecological distinctiveness. Contrary to a previous study on Cerrado mammals, species richness is expected to increase in Northern Cerrado, where homogenization of communities (decreasing spatial turnover) is also expected to occur especially through local invasions. We show that biotic homogenization (which is composed of local extinction of natives and local invasion of exotic species) will occur in two biological groups but through different subprocesses: local extinctions for mammals and local invasions for birds. Distinct conservation management actions should be directed depending on the outcomes of analyzes of alpha and spatial and temporal beta diversity, for example controlling species invasions in Northern Cerrado. Conservation studies should continue evaluating Cerrado in Brazil even under covid pandemic, as environmental situation in the country is not good and incentives for scientific studies are almost nonexistent.