Geographical distribution and migration routes of the medical bryophyte, <i>Climacium dendroides</i>, under climate warming in China

<i>Climacium dendroides</i> is a rare bryophyte resource with important medicinal value, which is mainly concentrated in the southwest and northeast China. In recent years, we found in the wild investigation that the population of <i>C. dendroides</i> had shrunk. In our study, based on high-resolution environmental variables and geographical occurrence records, the Maximum Entropy Model (MaxEnt) combined with ArcGIS was used to predict the spatial-temporal distributional pattern of <i>C. dendroides</i> in China under the current and future scenarios. Simulation results revealed that the total suitable area decreases by more than a third (–36.02%) in future scenarios. Further, the distributional centers moved to the northwest. Annual precipitation, max temperature of warmest month, and annual mean air temperature were the key environmental factors affecting the distribution of <i>C. dendroides</i>. Global warming coupled with the adverse effects of anthropogenic activities might accelerate the disappearance of suitable habitats for <i>C. dendroides</i>. Overall, our research provides useful indications for protecting the diversity of medical bryophytes and for their conservation. Supplemental data for this article is available online at http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/11263504.2021.1906348