A Multi-Factor Habitat Suitability Model for Asian Elephants in the Greater Mekong Subregion: Effects of Vegetation...

The habitat suitability of the endangered Asian elephant (Elephas maximus) is commonly assessed using climatic and topographic variables, whereas food-plant resources are rarely incorporated explicitly into regional-scale species distribution models. Here, we developed a comparative modeling framework to evaluate how the inclusion of food-plant resource layers modifies Asian elephant habitat suitability predictions under current and future climate scenarios. (1) The model incorporating food-plant variables produced a more restricted and spatially concentrated pattern of suitable habitat than the model excluding food-plant variables. (2) This contrast suggests that climate-dominated models may overestimate usable habitat in areas where key forage resources are limited or absent. (3) In addition, piecewise SEM suggested that the associations among climate, topography, food-plant resources, and predicted habitat suitability varied along latitudinal gradients. These findings indicate that food-plant resource layers can refine climate-based habitat suitability assessments by distinguishing broad climatic suitability from more realistic resource-based suitability. Conservation planning should therefore integrate food-plant restoration, habitat connectivity, and climate adaptation to improve habitat management and reduce human-elephant conflict.