Using species ranges, in particular those derived from species distribution models (SDM), to obtain characteristics of the species’ niche such as temperature tolerances is tempting. Over the past decade the literature has seen the increase in the use of SDMs based on locality data and spatially explicit datasets (climate, vegetation etc.). Furthermore, several studies have explored climatic niche evolution and niche conservatism using temperature and precipitation extracted from the resulting models in a phylogenetic context. However, species´ fundamental niches (set of abiotic conditions in which a species can live) are often incompletely characterized in SDMs, reconstructed mainly based on spotty locality data (about species presence and rarely including absence data). Indeed, a species´ realized niche, the actually occupied conditions where a species live, may be a subset of their fundamental niche due to lack of habitat availability, constraints on dispersion, and biotic interactions. Here, we produced SDMs for 50 species of neotropical reptiles and amphibians and compared extreme temperature estimates extracted from the modelled area (model-inferred) with thermo-physiological estimates of critical temperatures (physiology-inferred). When comparing experimental critical thermal maximum and minimums with temperature values extracted from the estimated range, we found a general pattern of maximum temperatures experienced that are cooler than the species maximum tolerances, and minimum temperatures close to or even colder than their minimum tolerances. Characterizing niche traits from SDMs is dangerous because SDMs are not representing the fundamental niche of species as measured with thermal physiology limits and they are also not deviating from the fundamental niche in a predictable way.

中文翻译：

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从物种分布模型估计的环境范围不能很好地预测蜥蜴和青蛙的生理耐受性

使用物种范围，特别是那些源自物种分布模型 (SDM) 的物种范围，来获得物种生态位的特征（例如温度耐受性）很诱人。在过去的十年中，文献已经看到基于位置数据和空间明确数据集（气候、植被等）的 SDM 的使用有所增加。此外，一些研究使用从系统发育背景下的所得模型中提取的温度和降水，探索了气候生态位进化和生态位保守性。然而，物种的基本生态位（一个物种可以生存的一组非生物条件）在 SDM 中通常不完整，主要基于参差不齐的位置数据（关于物种存在，很少包括缺失数据）重建。确实，一个物种实现了生态位，由于缺乏栖息地可用性、分散限制和生物相互作用，物种生活的实际占用条件可能是其基本生态位的一个子集。在这里，我们为 50 种新热带爬行动物和两栖动物制作了 SDM，并将从建模区域提取的极端温度估计值（模型推断）与临界温度的热生理学估计值（生理推断）进行了比较。在将实验临界热最大值和最小值与从估计范围中提取的温度值进行比较时，我们发现所经历的最高温度的一般模式比物种的最大容差低，而最低温度接近甚至低于其最小容差。