Susceptibility of European freshwater fish to climate change: species 1 profiling based on 2 life-history and environmental characteristics

Abstract
Climate change is expected to strongly affect freshwater fish communities. Combined with
other anthropogenic impacts, the impacts will alter species distributions and contribute to
population declines and local extinctions. To provide timely management and conservation of
fishes, it is relevant to identify species that will be most impacted by climate change and those
that will be resilient. Species traits are considered a promising source of information on
characteristics that influence resilience to various environmental conditions and impacts. We
collated life history traits and climatic niches of 443 European freshwater fish species and
compared those identified as susceptible to climate change to those that are considered to be
resilient. Significant differences were observed between the two groups in their distribution,
life-history and climatic niches, with climate-change susceptible species being distributed
more southwardly within Europe, and being characterized by higher threat levels, lower
commercial relevance, lower vulnerability to fishing, smaller body size and warmer thermal
envelopes. We establish a list of species revealed to be of highest priority for further research
and monitoring regarding climate change susceptibility within Europe. The presented
approach represents a promising tool, to quickly assess large groups of species regarding their
susceptibility to climate change and other threats, and to identify research and management
priorities.