Climate change is expected to alter the structure and functions of an ecosystem including species composition and its geographical distribution. There is limited understanding on how the habitat of the Himalayan range-restricted species would be affected under the influence of climate change. In the present study, we model the climate change impacts on habitat suitability of western tragopan (Tragopan melanocephalus), a range-restricted and vulnerable bird species in the Indian western Himalayas. The climate change scenarios of IPCC represented by representative concentration pathways (RCPs) viz. RCP 4.5, RCP 6.0, and RCP 8.5 were considered for assessing the habitat suitability for the year 2050 and 2070. Most influencial variables that may be linked to habitat suitability of Tragopan, such as bioclimatic variables, land use (forest cover and forest type), soil characteristics, and topographic variables (elevation, slope, aspect, heat load index) were considered to develop a model using the Maximum Entropy (MaxEnt) algorithm. MaxEnt is a widely used and accepted tool for modeling species distribution. The model’s performance for mapping habitat was evaluated by the Area Under Curve (AUC) (AUC > 90%). The measured TSS value 0.98 and Kappa value 0.71 were elaborated for the aptness of the model for suitable habitat mapping. It was observed that the suitable habitat of the western tragopan would shift towards higher elevations under all RCPs. The study would benefit to biodiversity conservators and policymaker for formulating future strategy and planning for conservation and management of the Himalayan range-restricted bird species. The approach of this study could be replicated with other range-restricted Himalayan bird species for future projections of suitable habitat.

预计气候变化将改变生态系统的结构和功能，包括物种组成及其地理分布。关于在气候变化的影响下喜马拉雅范围受限物种的栖息地将如何受到影响的理解尚有限。在本研究中，我们模拟了气候变化对西部tragopan（Tragopan melanocephalus）生境适应性的影响），这是印度西部喜马拉雅山范围有限且脆弱的鸟类。IPCC的气候变化情景以代表性的集中途径（RCP）为代表。考虑使用RCP 4.5，RCP 6.0和RCP 8.5来评估2050年和2070年的栖息地适宜性。大多数影响变量可能与Tragopan的栖息地适宜性有关，例如生物气候变量，土地利用（森林覆盖率和森林类型） ，土壤特性和地形变量（高程，坡度，纵横比，热负荷指数）被认为可以使用最大熵（MaxEnt）算法开发模型。MaxEnt是一种用于建模物种分布的广泛使用和公认的工具。通过曲线下面积（AUC）（AUC> 90％）评估了该模型绘制栖息地的性能。测得的TSS值为0.98，Kappa值为0。详细阐述了该模型适合于合适的栖息地测绘的71种方法。据观察，在所有RCPs下，西部tragopan的适宜生境将向更高的海拔转移。该研究将有益于生物多样性保护者和决策者制定喜马拉雅范围受限制鸟类的保护和管理的未来战略和计划。这项研究的方法可以与其他范围受限的喜马拉雅鸟类复制，以用于未来合适栖息地的预测。该研究将有益于生物多样性保护者和决策者制定喜马拉雅范围受限制鸟类的保护和管理的未来战略和计划。这项研究的方法可以与其他范围受限的喜马拉雅鸟类复制，以用于未来合适栖息地的预测。该研究将有利于生物多样性保护者和政策制定者制定喜马拉雅范围受限鸟类保护和管理的未来战略和计划。这项研究的方法可以与其他范围受限的喜马拉雅鸟类复制，以用于未来合适栖息地的预测。