PREDICTIVE HABITAT SUITABILITY MODELLING OF AXIS PORCINUS (HOG DEER) UNDER CURRENT AND FUTURE CLIMATE CHANGE SCENARIOS IN PUNJAB, PAKISTAN

It is anticipated that climate change will cause biodiversity loss by altering natural habitats and species distribution. The main purpose of the study was to model the current and future distribution of Axis porcinus to predict the changes in their habitat in Punjab, Pakistan. A Total of 32 variables including bioclimatic, natural, topographical and human impact variables were prepared. Dimension reduction was done by three methods, namely the Pearson's correlation, multi-collinearity analysis and principal component analysis (PCA) to achieve the appropriate number of predictors. The study predicted the potential distribution of species by the 2050s and 2070s under representative concentrative pathways (RCPs) RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5 climate change scenarios using earth observations and maximum entropy (MaxEnt) machine learning model. Results revealed that highly suitable areas for current distribution of Axis porcinus cover 451.3 Km(2). According to future projections suitable habitat will face an 18.7% decline by 2050s according to RCP 4.5 scenario or 52.8% based on the RCP 8.5 scenario which is alarming and protection measures are crucial. Based on the current and future distribution of the species, three priority conservation areas covering 632 Km(2) for Axis porcinus are identified. This study supports the formulation of current conservation policies and strategies for protection of the species keeping in view the impact of climate change scenarios.