Current and future potential distributions of three Dracaena Vand. ex L. species under two contrasting climate change scenarios in Africa

Forest undergrowth plants are tightly connected with the shady and humid conditions that occur under the canopy of tropical forests. However, projected climatic changes, such as decreasing precipitation and increasing temperature, negatively affect understory environments by promoting light-demanding and drought-tolerant species. Therefore, we aimed to quantify the influence of climate change on the spatial distribution of three selected forest undergrowth plants, Dracaena Vand. ex L. species, D. afromontana Mildbr., D. camerooniana Baker and D surculosa Lindl., simultaneously creating the most comprehensive location database for these species to date.
A total of 1223 herbarium records originating from tropical Africa and derived from 93 herbarium collections worldwide have been gathered, validated and entered into a database. Species-specific Maxent species distribution models (SDMs) based on 11 bioclimatic variables from the WorldClim database were developed for the species. HadGEM2-...