Prediction of environmental suitability for invasion of Mikania micrantha in India by species distribution modelling.

Environmental niche modelling was used to assess the invasion of Mikania micrantha H.B.K, an extremely fast growing, perennial vine and one of the world's most notorious invaders. It has spread in many parts of India, especially south-west and north-eastern states and caused severe damage to tree crops and agroforestry plantations in moist tropical zones. Using known occurrence points, the environmental suitability for the risk of invasion of M. micrantha in India was predicted using three species distribution models (BioClinn, GARP and MaxEnt). From the three models, BioClim and GARP showed higher accuracy whereas MaxEnt showed comparatively lower accuracy. The Jackknife evaluation result indicated that Bio 13 (Precipitation of wettest period) and Bio 3 (lsothermality) were having high percentage of contribution for spread of M. micrantha. This species showed most significant (p <= 0.001) difference in distribution frequency along the altitudinal gradient and climatic zone. Thus, it is reasonable to expect a decline in the frequency of occurrence with an increase in altitude.