According to a study by an international team of scientists, in the last 200 years the flora of the Chimborazo volcano – the highest mountain in Ecuador, at 6,268 m and the point on the planet furthest from the center of the Earth – has risen an average of 500 meters to cause of environmental changes.
This research provides new data on the importance of tropical areas, which are home to most of the planet’s biodiversity, and the impact of climate warming on high mountain tropical flora. From the German scientist, traveler and naturalist Alexander von Humboldt , who at the beginning of the 19th century traveled to Latin America to map the distribution of plants and investigate the causes that determine the growth limits of the different species, comes much of our knowledge about the theme.
His descriptions and illustrations of the flora and fauna, including those in the Tableau Physique that compiles all the plant varieties present in the Chimborazo Andean volcano, represent the oldest known data on the altitudinal distribution of these species. In the summer of 2012, a team of scientists led by experts from the University of Aarhus (Denmark) mapped the current distribution of the flora of the Chimborazo volcano (Ecuador). Well, when comparing it with the data collected by Humboldt in 1802, it can be seen that the plants have moved up an average of 500 meters.
Specifically, the highest flora has climbed from 4,600 meters to a level close to 5,200. The last vestiges of plant life have been found at 5,185 meters. It is a small plant of the sunflower family, half covered in snow and in full bloom despite the cold, low atmospheric pressure and strong wind, according to Naia Morueta-Holme, lead author of the study published in PNAS and scientist in the Institute of Bioscience of the Danish university.
In a generalized way, most plants have been able to adapt over the last 200 years to the new conditions, although some species have not moved so much and are lagging behind. But there are many common species with great capacity for dispersal and adaptation to highly variable conditions that have moved even further. Other studies show that in the triopical areas there is less rainfall today than two centuries ago, which has contributed to the reduction of the glaciers that cover the top of the volcano.
To this is added the intensive agriculture that has developed in the lower areas and the species introduced by humans. The combination of human-induced climate changes and the direct impact on plant communities through agriculture near the volcano are some of the causes that explain the changes caused in vegetation, which are greater than in any other region outside of the tropics.
