Table 1 Examples of adaptation actions and their primary objective for the six categories of the “R–R–T scale”.
Categories | Examples of actions | Primary objective |
|---|---|---|
1. Active Resistance | Eradicate non-native species in grassland or forest ecosystems. | Actively prevent changes in species composition. |
Install and manage water control structures to maintain historic water levels in a coastal impoundment. | Actively resist rising sea levels. | |
2. Passive Resistance | Create or expand protected areas in climate refugia. | Passively maintain current ecosystems. |
Purchase conservation easements to protect a species that is endangered by climate change. | Passively protect species in their historical habitat. | |
3. Resilience | Reconnect previously existing corridors to allow the migration of specific species. | Enhance the ability of species to persist as climate changes by removing barriers to movement and dispersal |
Restore streams by re-introducing beaver. | Increase resilience of stream functions to natural disturbances such as floods and droughts. | |
4. Autonomous Transformation | Connect relatively warmer and colder aquatic areas. | Create opportunities for species movements to seek cold water refugia. |
Apply forestry techniques designed to increase native species diversity. | Increase chances that some species will thrive as climate changes. | |
5. Directed Transformation | Use assisted migration by planting with seeds gathered in a warmer part of a species’ current range (aka assisted gene flow). | Drive transition towards climate-adapted genetic composition of species or populations. |
Use climate-informed forestry to direct future species composition (e.g., post-harvest planting using drought-resistant native species). | Drive transition towards more climate-adapted native species compositions. | |
6. Accelerated Transformation | Use assisted migration to move a species outside of its current or historic range (aka assisted range expansion). | Accelerate climate-driven species transition. |
Restore riparian ecosystems by inoculating soils with non-native inoculant materials that are adapted to warmer and dryer conditions. | Accelerate transition towards more climate-adapted ecosystem functions. |
