Model comparison
After conducting repeated random k -fold cross-validation, I observed that the ten-year resolution approach outperformed the standard 30-year average approach in terms of the omission rate for withheld data, while the other resolutions performed the same or worse based on some validation metrics. First, the AUC validation values of the standard approach were significantly higher than those of the one-year and five-year time-matched approaches (Fig. 6a). When comparing with the ten-year time-matched approach, the AUC values of the standard approach were still higher, but the difference was not significant. The Continuous Boyce Index (Fig. 6b) and the 10thpercentile of training omission rate (Fig. 6c) showed similar (non-significant) values between the standard and time-matched approaches. However, the omission rate based on the 18 fully withheld occurrences (OR.W) indicated a higher omission rate for the 30-year standard approach than for each of the three temporal resolutions (Fig. 6d).
Visual inspection showed that the standard 30-year average and the ten-year time-matched approaches provide more accurate predictions than the other two approaches (Fig. 7 and Fig. S1). The one-year matching approach overpredicts suitability in the northern and southern parts of the study area, while the predictions of the five-year matching approach are narrower than the one-year approach but still contain some unrealistic predictions of suitable conditions to the west of the Sierra Madre Oriental between 20°N and 22°N. In contrast, the standard and ten-year matching approaches have similar predictions. However, there is a larger prediction at the north of the potential distribution for the ten-year matching approaches. A more detailed comparison of ecological plausibility between these two approaches is found in Supplemental material (Fig. S2). Moreover, the number of times the withheld data were predicted as suitable (represented by black circles in Fig. 7) shows that the time-matched approaches have higher prediction rates than the standard approach (which supports the quantitative test).