Spatio-temporal shifts driven by climate change threaten persistence and resilience of honey bee populations

Mert Kükrer 

Understanding how climate shapes intraspecific genetic turnover is critical for predicting biodiversity responses to global change, yet such analyses remain limited for systems where natural adaptation and human-mediated dispersal jointly structure diversity. Here, we investigate the spatio-temporal dynamics of genetic composition in the western honey bee (Apis mellifera) across Anatolia and Thrace, a major historical refugium harboring five subspecies. Using a dataset of 672 individuals genotyped at 30 microsatellite loci, we characterize population structure and model ancestry compositions as a function of environmental and geographic variables. We integrate Gradient Forests and Generalized Dissimilarity Modelling to identify key climatic drivers of intra-specific turnover and project future changes under multiple CMIP6 climate scenarios. We detect five major ancestral groups with widespread admixture structured by both spatial processes and environmental gradients. While geographic distance explains a substantial proportion of variation, climatic variables account for a large fraction of ancestry turnover. Spatial projections reveal distinct ecological regions corresponding to subspecies distributions, with high turnover zones aligned with major geographic and ecological barriers. Climate projections indicate substantial restructuring of ancestry compositions over the 21st century. Most ancestral groups show declines in persistence and resilience, whereas lineages associated with warmer and drier conditions expand under future scenarios. Regions of high uniqueness and refugia contract, while areas experiencing rapid turnover and novel ancestry compositions increase. Existing Genetic Conservation Areas provide incomplete representation of diversity and are projected to lose effectiveness under future climates. Our results demonstrate that climate change is likely to disrupt spatial genetic structure, promote admixture, and threaten persistence and resilience of honey bee populations. By modeling ancestry composition as a multidimensional proxy for genetic variation, for the first time to our knowledge, this study provides a scalable framework for forecasting intraspecific biodiversity dynamics and informing conservation and management strategies under global change.