Climatic niche
Beyond the differences between the balance in recruited and extinct species, we also found that their climatic niches are significantly different. In the deciduous forests, recruited species niches are characterised by higher temperatures, meaning that those adapted to colder temperatures are being locally excluded and replaced by hotter climate species (Table 2). A similar trend regarding the precipitation niche was found in the deciduous forests: recruited species’ niches are negatively associated with low precipitation (Table 2), meaning that species with higher precipitation niches are being recruited. In semideciduous and evergreen forests, no significant differences regarding climatic species niches (temperature and precipitation) were found (Tables 2 and 3).