What is it about?
Grasslands in South Africa are under threat from climate change. This article demonstrates that a particular grassland-associated rodent species (the vlei rat) has undergone a contraction of its range in the past 100 years and its range is predicted to contract even further in the future. All grassland communities of small mammals are likely to be similarly affected
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Why is it important?
Forewarned is forearmed and climate change should be taken into consideration when assessing the conservation threat of species using the IUCN Redlist system.
Perspectives
I have worked on small mammals for over 20 years, first at the Durban Natural Science Museum and since 2010 at University of Venda. The research formed a part of the MSc thesis of my student Aluwani Nengovhela who is currently studying for her PHD in Toulouse, France
Peter Taylor
University of Venda
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Past, present, and future distribution of Afromontane rodents (Muridae: Otomys) reflect climate-change predicted biome changes, Mammalia, January 2016, De Gruyter,
DOI: 10.1515/mammalia-2015-0033.
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