Conservation priority areas for narrow-range reptiles of the Pampas grassland, east-central Argentina

Abstract

We analyzed the spatial distribution of the narrow-range and threatened reptiles from the Pampas grassland, a region with high human influence in east-central Argentina. We used field-collected and museum specimens combined with high-resolution environmental variables to recognize common distributional patterns and the variables that best explain them, estimate the suitable habitat for each species, identify conservation priority areas, and finally propose management and conservation priorities related to the current protected areas. Distribution models diverged into two distributional patterns for the narrow-range species: suitable habitat for most species in highland grasslands of the montane environment, and suitable habitat for Liolaemus multimaculatus in the grassland of the coastal dunes. Growing degree-days was the most informative environmental variable for constructing the distribution models, followed by annual potential evapotranspiration, and temperature seasonality. We proposed priority areas on the basis of two different conservation algorithms: the additive benefit function, which favors the montane and sandy environments, prioritizing areas with high richness of narrow-range species, and the core-area zonation, which prioritizes the occurrence of all biodiversity features, further indicating fragmented areas in the surroundings with low human influence index, but lacking the studied species. Regardless of the algorithm used, our results showed that the existing protected areas in the region are inadequate to protect the narrow-range reptiles. Protecting at least 5% of the priority areas with higher conservation values and considering the cost of the human influence index, the protected areas represented only 12.75% of these priority areas. Therefore, we identified the main management strategies to increase the representativeness of priority areas. Our findings are largely consistent with previous reports in the Neotropical region, highlighting the need to assign a larger area for conservation purposes.