Conclusions
Assessing changes in quantity and quality of available habitats allows the generation of more detailed interpretations of population dynamics in response to past climate changes, and predictions of future changes in climatic conditions. SDMs are useful to infer changes in distribution of organisms, and here we show how niche marginality can be used as a proxy to predict species’ abundance and selection pressure. Results showed that species on the Baja California peninsula responded to changes in climatic conditions based on their ecological niche characteristics. Some highland clades were favored during LGM climatic conditions, since besides a decrease in the area of suitable conditions they may have presented increased fitness within those available habitats due to those habitats having lower niche marginality. This demonstrates the decoupling between habitat quality and quantity relevant to the evolution of populations. On the other hand, lowland desert clades seem to have better habitat conditions under present climates in terms of habitat quantity and quality. Overall, we were able to generate explicit predictions about population history that can be tested with genomic data to generate a better understanding of population dynamics driven by climatic changes in habitat quantity and quality.