Assessing Suitable Habitats for Gerbera piloselloides (L.)Cass. in China Using an Optimized MaxEnt Model and Key Environmental Drivers

Gerbera piloselloides (L.)Cass. is an important ethnomedicinal plant. Wild populations are steadily declining, however, posing a risk of failure to meet future market demand. Investigating suitable habitats for this plant and key influencing factors is crucial for its artificial cultivation. In this study, we implemented an optimized MaxEnt to project suitable habitats for the target species in five different periods and explored the impact of different environmental variables on its distribution. Our study findings provide confirmation of the following: (1) The current and future potential distributions of Gerbera piloselloides are primarily located in the areas south of the Qinling–Huaihe boundary in China, with future expansions expected to shift northward and westward. (2) Notably, there was a contraction in the junction regions of the provinces of Jiangxi, Anhui, Hunan, and Hubei. (3) The number of highly suitable habitats in Fujian, Guangdong, Yunnan, and Guangxi is expanding; in comparison, the number in Guizhou, Sichuan, and Hainan is declining. (4) The primary environmental determinants shaping its range, together with the threshold values for highly suitable habitats, are the minimum temperature of the coldest month (bio6, 0.88–22.58 °C) and the temperature seasonality (bio4, 461.54–763.9). The findings presented in this work provide support for the artificial cultivation and conservation of this plant.