Toni Lyn Morelli, Ph.D.
Toni Lyn Morelli is a Research Ecologist at the NE Climate Science Center, where she uses field studies, ecological modeling, and genetics to help resource managers conserve species in the face of climate and land use change. Current projects include studying climate change refugia, the effects of snow loss on montane & Arctic species, and decision analysis and coproduction for climate adaptation.
Biography
Toni Lyn grew up near Detroit and received a B.S. in Zoology from Michigan State University. For her Ph.D. at Stony Brook University on Long Island, NY, she studied lemur behavior, ecology, and genetics in Madagascar. After her Ph.D., Toni Lyn Morelli worked as a postdoctoral fellow at UC Berkeley to understand how climate change had affected small mammals and montane meadows over the last century. She has also worked for the U.S. Forest Service, both as a research ecologist at the Pacific Southwest Research Station and as the Technical Advisor to the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Toni Lyn uses translational ecology, species distribution modeling, occupancy modeling, geospatial analysis, population and landscape genetics techniques, and decision analysis to facilitate natural resource management and habitat and species conservation in the face of climate and land use change. Current projects include studying the impacts of climate change in boreal ecosystems, including carnivore and hare work from my Ph.D. student Alexej Siren; helping the National Park Service update its taxonomy and analyze citizen science data; organizing a Regional Effort on Invasive Species and Climate Change (RISCC) Management; and a continued focus on operationalizing the concept of climate change refugia.
Science and Products
Vernal Pool Inundation Models
A Climate Risk Management Screening and Assessment Review for Madagascar’s Country Development Cooperation Strategy
Madagascar, a country rich in natural capital and biodiversity but with high levels of poverty, food insecurity, and population growth, faces a number of development challenges, including obtaining sustained financial support from external sources and building internal capacity to address the poor environmental, health, and socio-economic conditions. Climate change poses an increasing threat...
Workflows to Support Integrated Predictive Science Capacity: Forecasting Invasive Species for Natural Resource Planning and Risk Assessment
Insect pests cost billions of dollars per year globally, negatively impacting food crops and infrastructure and contributing to the spread of disease. Timely information regarding developmental stages of pests can facilitate early detection and control, increasing efficiency and effectiveness. To address this need, the USA National Phenology Network (USA-NPN) created a suite of “Pheno Forecast...
Increasing the Resilience and Resistance of Climate-Vulnerable Species and Ecosystems
This project has two phases: Phase I: Determining causes of vulnerability The NE CASC has as part of its mission to conduct stakeholder-driven research to understand climate Impacts on freshwater resources and land-use change as well as ecosystem vulnerability and species response to climate variability and change. In the face of increasing temperatures, shifting precipitation patterns, and...
Understanding Species' Range Shifts in Response to Climate Change: Results from a Systematic National Review
Climate change represents one of the foremost drivers of ecological change, yet its documented impacts on biodiversity remain uncertain and complex. Although there have been many published studies on species shifting their geographic ranges in response to climate change, it is still challenging to identify the specific mechanisms and conditions that facilitate range shifts in some species and...
Automating the use of citizen scientists’ biodiversity surveys in iNaturalist to facilitate early detection of species’ responses to climate change
A BioBlitz is a field survey method for finding and documenting as many species as possible in a specific area over a short period. The National Park Service and National Geographic Society hosted the largest BioBlitz survey ever in 2016; people in more than 120 national parks used the iNaturalist app on mobile devices to document organisms they observed. Resulting records have Global...
Webinar: How to Prioritize Key Areas for Conservation Efforts in a Changing Climate: A Look at “Climate Refugia”
View this webinar to learn more about climate change refugia.
Climate Assessments and Scenario Planning (CLASP)
This project compiled, synthesized, and communicated tailored climate change information to NE CASC stakeholders, including Landscape Conservation Cooperatives (LCC), state and federal agencies, and tribal communities. Our mission is to make climate science actionable by getting to know our stakeholders and the decisions they face, and delivering climate information that is directly relevant...
Climate Effects on the Culture and Ecology of Sugar Maple
Maple syrup is produced from the sap of sugar maple trees collected in the late winter and early spring. Native American tribes have collected and boiled down sap for centuries, and the tapping of maple trees is a cultural touchstone for many people in the Northeast and Midwest. Overall demand for maple syrup has been rapidly rising as more people appreciate this natural sweetener. Yet...
Evaluation of Downscaled Climate Modeling Techniques for the Northeast U.S.: A Case Study of Maple Syrup Production
Downscaling is the process of making a coarse-scale global climate model into a finer resolution in order to capture some of the localized detail that the coarse global models cannot resolve. There are two general approaches of downscaling: dynamical and statistical. Within those, many dynamical models have been developed by different institutions, and there are a number of statistical...
Identifying climate-resistant vernal pools: Hydrologic refugia for amphibian reproduction under droughts and climate change
Vernal pools of the northeastern United States provide important breeding habitat for amphibians but may be sensitive to droughts and climate change. These seasonal wetlands typically fill by early spring and dry by mid-to-late summer. Because climate change may produce earlier and stronger growing-season evapotranspiration combined with...
Cartwright, Jennifer M.; Morelli, Toni Lyn; Campbell Grant, Evan H. A climate risk management screening and assessment review for Madagascar’s Country Development Cooperation Strategy
Madagascar, a country rich in natural capital and biodiversity but with high levels of poverty, food insecurity, and population growth, faces a number of development challenges, including obtaining sustained financial support from external sources and building internal capacity to address the poor environmental, health, and socio-economic...
Cushing, Janet Alice; Weiskopf, Sarah R.; Morelli, Toni Lyn; Myers, Bonnie Habitat use as indicator of adaptive capacity to climate change
AimPopulations of cold‐adapted species at the trailing edges of geographic ranges are particularly vulnerable to the negative effects of climate change from the combination of exposure to warm temperatures and high sensitivity to heat. Many of these species are predicted to decline under future climate scenarios, but they could persist if they can...
Teitelbaum, Claire S.; Siren, Alexej P. K.; Coffel, Ethan; Foster, Jane R.; Frair, Jacqueline L.; Hinton, Joseph W.; Horton, Radley W.; Kramer, David W.; Lesk, Corey; Raymond, Colin; Wattles, David; Zeller, Katherine; Morelli, Toni Lyn Climate-change refugia in boreal North America: What, where, and for how long?
TThe vast boreal biome plays an important role in the global carbon cycle but is experiencing particularly rapid climate warming, threatening the integrity of valued ecosystems and their component species. We developed a framework and taxonomy to identify climate‐change refugia potential in the North American boreal region, summarizing current...
Stralberg, Diana; Arseneault, Dominique; Baltzer, Jennifer; Barber, Quinn; Bayne, Erin; Boulanger, Yan; Brown, Carissa; Cooke, Hilary; Devito, Kevin; Edwards, Jason; Estevo, Cesar; Flynn, Nadele; Frelich, Lee; Hogg, E. H. (T.); Johnston, Mark; Logan, Travis; Matsuoka, Steven M.; Moore, Paul; Morelli, Toni Lyn; Morissette, Julienne; Nelson, Elizabeth; Nenzén, Hedvig; Nielsen, Scott; Parisien, Marc-André; Pedlar, John; Price, David; Schmiegelow, Fiona; Slattery, Stuart; Sonnentag, Oliver; Thompson, Daniel; Whitman, Ellen Validating climate‐change refugia: Empirical bottom‐up approaches to support management actions
Efforts to conserve biodiversity increasingly focus on identifying climate‐change refugia – areas relatively buffered from contemporary climate change over time that enable species persistence. Identification of refugia typically includes modeling the distribution of a species’ current habitat and then extrapolating that distribution given...
Barrows, Cameron W.; Ramirez, Aaron R.; Sweet, Lynn C.; Morelli, Toni Lyn; Millar, Constance I.; Frakes, Neil; Rodgers, Jane; Mahalovich, Mary Frances Climate‐change refugia: Biodiversity in the slow lane
Climate‐change adaptation focuses on conducting and translating research to minimize the dire impacts of anthropogenic climate change, including threats to biodiversity and human welfare. One adaptation strategy is to focus conservation on climate‐change refugia (that is, areas relatively buffered from contemporary climate change over time that...
Morelli, Toni Lyn; Barrows, Cameron W.; Ramirez, Aaron R.; Cartwright, Jennifer M.; Ackerly, David D.; Eaves, Tatiana D.; Ebersole, Joseph L.; Krawchuk, Meg A.; Letcher, Benjamin; Mahalovich, Mary Frances; Meigs, Garrett; Michalak, Julia; Millar, Constance I.; Quinones, Rebecca M.; Stralberg, Diana; Thorne, James H. Examining the mechanisms of species responses to climate change: Are there biological thresholds?
Climate-change-driven shifts in distribution and abundance have been documented in many species. However, in order to better predict species responses, managers are seeking to understand the mechanisms that are driving these changes, including any thresholds that might soon be crossed. Leveraging the research that has already been supported by...
DeLuca, William; Bonnot, Thomas W.; Siren, Alexej P. K.; Horton, Radley M.; Griffin, Curtice R.; Morelli, Toni Lyn Do empirical observations support commonly-held climate change range shift hypotheses? A systematic review protocol
Background Among the most widely anticipated climate-related impacts to biodiversity are geographic range shifts, whereby species shift their spatial distribution in response to changing climate conditions. In particular, a series of commonly articulated hypotheses have emerged: species are expected to shift their distributions to higher...
Rubenstein, Madeleine A.; Weiskopf, Sarah R.; Carter, Shawn; Eaton, Mitchell; Johnson, Ciara; Lynch, Abigail; Miller, Brian W.; Morelli, Toni Lyn; Rodriguez, Mari Angel; Terando, Adam; Thompson, Laura Adjusting the lens of invasion biology to focus on the impacts of climate-driven range shifts
As Earth’s climate rapidly changes, species range shifts are considered key to species persistence. However, some range-shifting species will alter community structure and ecosystem processes. By adapting existing invasion risk assessment frameworks, we can identify characteristics shared with high-impact introductions and thus predict potential...
Wallingford, Piper D.; Morelli, Toni Lyn; Allen, Jenica M.; Beaury, Evelyn M.; Blumenthal, Dana M.; Bradley, Bethany A.; Dukes, Jeffrey S.; Early, Regan; Fusco, Emily J.; Goldberg, Deborah E.; Ibanez, Ines; Laginhas, Brittany B.; Vila, Montserrat; Sorte, Cascade J. B. Gardening with climate-smart native plants in the Northeast
Bradley, Bethany A.; Bayer, A.; Griffin, Bridget; Joubran, Sydni; Laginhas, Brittany B.; Munro, Lara; Talbot, Sam; Allen, Jenica M.; Barker-Plotkin, Audrey; Beaury, Evelyn M.; Brown-Lima, Carrie; Fusco, Emily J.; Mount, Hailey; Servais, Bailey; Morelli, Toni Lyn Climate change effects on biodiversity, ecosystems, ecosystem services, and natural resource management in the United States
Climate change is a pervasive and growing global threat to biodiversity and ecosystems. Here, we present the most up-to-date assessment of climate change impacts on biodiversity, ecosystems, and ecosystem services in the U.S. and implications for natural resource management. We draw from the 4th National Climate Assessment to summarize observed...
Weiskopf, Sarah R.; Rubenstein, Madeleine A.; Crozier, Lisa; Gaichas, Sarah; Griffis, Roger; Halofsky, Jessica E.; Hyde, Kimberly J. W.; Morelli, Toni Lyn; Morisette, Jeffrey T.; Muñoz, Roldan C.; Pershing, Andrew J.; Peterson, David L.; Poudel, Rajendra; Staudinger, Michelle D.; Sutton-Grier, Ariana E.; Thompson, Laura; Vose, James; Weltzin, Jake; Whyte, Kyle Powys Multi‐species occupancy models: Review, roadmap, and recommendations
Recent technological and methodological advances have revolutionized wildlife monitoring. Although most biodiversity monitoring initiatives are geared towards focal species of conservation concern, researchers are increasingly studying entire communities, specifically the spatiotemporal drivers of community size and structure and interactions...
Devarajan, Kadambari; Tenan, Simone; Morelli, Toni Lyn
Maple Syrup Production to Decline in New England in the Next Century Says New Study by UMass Amherst and Northeast CASC
Climate change will move peak syrup yield northward and will cut New England’s yield by half.
Managing Climate Change Refugia to Protect Wildlife
Natural and cultural areas that will remain similar to what they are today -- despite climate change -- need to be identified, managed and conserved as “refugia” for at-risk species, according to a study published today in PLOS One. The study sets out, for the first time, specific steps to help identify and manage these more resilient and climate-stable havens for plants, animals and fishes.