A Comparison of Climatic Niches of the Same Alpine Plant Species in the Central Caucasus and the Alps

It has been known for years that the elevational and latitudinal range limits of plant taxa are likely to be correlated (e.g. Humboldt 1817; Pellissier et al. 2013; Randin et al. 2013) and the elevation-for-latitude correspondence model has for long attracted ecologists and biogeographers. However, comparisons of the environmental niche of a common set of native plant species between geographically isolated regions but sharing similar climatic conditions have rarely been achieved (but see Randin et al. 2006 in the Alps). The large number of shared alpine plant species between the Alps and the Caucasus and the increasing availability of georeferenced occurrences and climatic data offer now opportunities to perform such across-mountain range comparisons