Demography and dispersal influence the relationship between habitat suitability and population density

A central goal of ecology is to understand spatial patterns of species densities. Habitat suitability estimates from species distribution models (SDMs) could be used to represent species density and overcome the scarcity of density data. However, there is mixed evidence that habitat suitability is a reliable descriptor of density, and it is suggested that local dynamics affect the relationship between habitat suitability and density. We simulated population dynamics for 200 virtual species considering different combinations of factors (demographic stochasticity, dispersal, and intraspecific competition) that affect population sizes and SDMs were trained using different sets of environmental predictors to evaluate when habitat suitability reflects densities. We also examined the generalities of these relationships in nature considering 200 North American bird species sampled by the Breeding Bird Survey. We found that even when population growth rate and demographic stochasticity were the only factors driving population dynamics and SDMs are trained with the two environmental factors that controlled population density, habitat suitability was not consistently related to virtual species densities. Incorporating dispersal dynamics and spatial differences in intraspecific competition had negative effects on the relationship between habitat suitability and density, showing that these factors influence these relationships. Similarly, habitat suitability could not explain the density of North American birds. Together, our results suggest that the use of habitat suitability estimates from SDMs to understand population densities should be avoided as habitat suitability does not relate to density under many scenarios.

• Publication year

  2026

• Venue

  Ecography

• Publication date

  2026-02-02

• Fields of study

  Not labeled

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1002/ecog.08299
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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