Spatial Analysis For Conservation and Sustainability
Birds
Birds have evolved to fill a diverse set of niches, and because of their manifold adaptations to different habitats, and the relative ease with which they are detected, they are a great taxon to understand the effects of land use, climate, and other factors on the ability of wild species to maintain viable populations.
1. Habitat conservation, particularly for large, multiple use areas, must account for the needs of multiple species. However, an unresolved issue is how to manage habitat when the needs of resident species con?ict and when the habitat can only be modelled at a coarse scale. Here, we illustrate an approach to optimizing habitat management using an example of a community of forest-breeding birds. 2. We used potential habitat maps for 20 bird species in northern Wisconsin and identi?ed a spatial arrangement that maximizes conservation value for multiple species, maximizes connectivity and minimizes the area needed for conservation. To do this, we ranked each cell of the study area using a nested percentage value, with for example the highest-ranking 1% holding lands of highest conservation value. 3. As we progressively increased the portion of landscape considered, starting with the highestranking habitat ?rst, the number of species for which the minimum habitat requirements were met reached plateaux at 3% and 20% of the landscape. To provide enough area to meet the minimum habitat requirements for all but two species, an estimated 20% of the habitat with the highest conservation value, c. 1 million hectares, would need to be maintained. Of that 20% highest-ranking area, 42% was on public lands, compared with 28% for the study area. 4. Tribal lands held a disproportionally large amount of area estimated to be of high conservation value: within the highest-ranking 1% of land, 14% consisted of tribal lands, while these lands held only 5% of the entire study area's forests. 5. Synthesis and applications. Hierarchical prioritization provided an e?cient mapping approach and the regional perspective necessary to identify management opportunities for a wide range of species. However, it could not explicitly address con?icts among species with overlapping potential habitat but incompatible ?ne-scale habitat needs. Ignoring this issue may lead to a failure to meet conservation objectives. This issue of habitat mischaracterization needs to be recognized in conservation planning objectives, preferably integrated in an optimization strategy, and can only be partly addressed with a post hoc, stepwise heuristic approach
Urbanization causes the simplification of natural habitats, resulting in animal communities dominated by exotic species with few top predators. In recent years, however, many predators such as hawks, and in the US coyotes and cougars, have become increasingly common in urban environments. Hawks in the Accipiter genus, especially, are recovering from widespread population declines and are increasingly common in urbanizing landscapes. Our goal was to identify factors that determine the occupancy, colonization and persistence of Accipiter hawks in a major metropolitan area. Through a novel combination of citizen science and advanced remote sensing, we quantified how urban features facilitate the dynamics and long-term establishment of Accipiter hawks. Based on data from Project FeederWatch, we quantified 21 years (1996–2016) of changes in the spatiotemporal dynamics of Accipiter hawks in Chicago, IL, USA. Using a multi-season occupancy model, we estimated Cooper’s (Accipiter cooperii) and sharp-shinned (A. striatus) hawk occupancy dynamics as a function of tree canopy cover, impervious surface cover and prey availability. In the late 1990s, hawks occupied 26% of sites around Chicago, but after two decades, their occupancy fluctuated close to 67% of sites and they colonized increasingly urbanized areas. Once established, hawks persisted in areas with high levels of impervious surfaces as long as those areas supported high abundances of prey birds. Urban areas represent increasingly habitable environments for recovering predators, and understanding the precise urban features that drive colonization and persistence is important for wildlife conservation in an urbanizing world.
Understanding past and current patterns of species richness is essential for predicting how these patterns may be affected by future global change. The species energy hypothesis predicts that higher abundance and richness of animal species occur where available energy is higher and more consistently available. There is a wide range of remote sensing proxies for available energy, such as vegetation productivity, but it is not clear which best predict species richness. Our goal here was to evaluate different proxies for annual plant productivity from Terra and Aqua Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) as input for the Dynamic Habitat Indices (DHIs), and to determine how well they predict the richness of breeding bird species in six functional guilds across the conterminous United States. The DHIs are measures of vegetation productivity over the course of a year and consist of three components: (1) cumulative productivity (DHI Cum), (2) minimum productivity (DHI Min), and (3) intra-annual variation of productivity (DHI Var). We hypothesized that increases in cumulative and minimum productivity and reductions in intra-annual variation will be associated with higher species richness. We calculated the DHIs from a range of MODIS 1000-m vegetation productivity data sets for 2003– 2014, i.e., the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI), Fraction of absorbed Photosynthetically Active Radiation (FPAR), Leaf Area Index (LAI), and Gross Primary Productivity (GPP). We summarized bird species richness of different guilds within ecoregions (n = 85) based on abundance maps derived from the N3000 routes of the North American Breeding Bird Survey for 2006 to 2012. Generally, we found all the DHIs had high explanatory power for predicting breeding bird species richness. However, the strength of the associations between the DHIs and bird species richness depended on habitat, nest placement, and migratory behavior. We found highest correlations for habitat-based guilds, such as grassland breeding species (R2 adj 0.66–0.73 for the multiple DHI regression model; R2 adj 0.41–0.61 for minimum DHI) and woodland breeding species (R2 adj 0.34–0.60 for the multiple DHI regression model; R2 adj 0.26–0.51 for cumulative DHI). The strong relationship between the DHIs and bird species richness reinforces the importance of vegetation productivity as a determinant of species diversity patterns, and the usefulness of satellite data for applying the species energy hypothesis to predictions in service to conservation.
Hillside of village sacred forest with view of valley below
In northwestern Yunnan, China, certain patches of forests are considered sacred. What does that mean? It means that people go into the forest to pray or to offer gifts to their same gods because they believe their lives will be blessed and successful if they do so. Jodi was interested in the biodiversity of sacred forests and inventoried which bird species occur there. Jodi end up publishing a bird field guide both in English and in Mandarin as a result of her work (Birds of Shangrila PDF). Later on, Teri conducted interviews with locals because she was interested in understanding how local people see sacred forests, but also to understand if an extra conservation status was necessary in order to preserve these little patches.
Conducting survey about sacred village forests
As a result of the interviews, Teri came to the conclusion that people do not see the forest as a wildlife habitat or as an area that provides other ecosystem service such as clean water or soil protection. Instead, the sacred forests serve the single purpose of pleasing the gods and thereby ensure that people’s lives go on smoothly. This perception of the forest is the same across genders and age groups, which indicates that unless there is a major shift in the local belief system, there is no immediate danger of losing village sacred forest areas.”
Max made a technological contribution to both the fields of wildlife ecology, and parks & recreation by developing a device to measure how heavily trails are used. His goal was to quantify both group size and frequency of groups (groups/hour) along a given trail, but the available solutions were more than his research budget could manage. Having someone count hikers all day along several trails required more personnel than was practical. Meanwhile, he worried that sampling use in small time periods would provide representative data, because trail use varies throughout the day. The idea to use an automatic sensor was desirable, but the options on the market were too expensive. So he collaborated with someone with technical expertise to invent a tool that met his needs.
Components of the Trail Monitor inside a protective weather-proof box
The solution was found in open source software and DIY hardware. First, he acquired a passive infrared (PIR) sensor that can detect warm-bodied objects that passed by (these are the same types of sensors that control automatic light switches by detecting when someone walks into a room). Then, he connected this sensor to an Arduino Uno board (http://www.arduino.cc/) that supports open source software. The board receives input from the sensor, and can be controlled by a user-written script. This is connected to a data logging shield (http://www.adafruit.com/product/1141) which contains a clock and an SD card to store data. Then, the data can be imported Excel sheet. Max used pivot tables to translate the sensor’s detections into his variables of interest. For example, the duration of time the sensor is activated can be used as an index of the number of people in a group passing by.
Installing a trail monitor along a trail
Max’s invention is a great alternative to what’s commercially available, in part due to the price point: one of Max’s units costs less than $250, in contrast to commercially available counters that cost about $1000/unit. Also, Max’s device can be left out in the woods for about a week between battery replacement. Its relatively small size means it can be easily hidden, which makes it relatively safe from tampering. Thus, Max continues to produce technology that will likely be used by many researchers in the future! “
In an unusual twist, Paul Schilke’s interest in terrestrial birds has led him to study aquatic systems.
Map of study area (Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest) with study sites and bodies of water.
Many aerial insectivore bird species, such as swallows and flycatchers, have been declining since the 1980s, but researchers aren’t sure why because little is known about how these birds use the resources around them. This guild is defined by its habit of capturing flying insects in midair, as opposed to the gleaner guild that picks insects off of substrates like leaves or twigs. Many of these flying insects begin their lifecycle in aquatic systems, so Paul thought that the differential decline in the aerial feeding guild might lie in the lakes and streams.
Using records from 317 locations within the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest in Northern Wisconsin, Paul compared presence of the aerial and gleaner insectivore guild members to estimated insect productivity in nearby lakes and streams, controlling for habitat differences (Figure 1). He estimated insect probability using a model from Bartrons et al. (2013), which used an extensive meta-analysis to determine the relationships between aquatic insect productivity and basic properties of lakes and streams such as temperature, surface area, and clarity. As expected given their feeding behavior, gleaners preferred forested habitats while aerial insectivores preferred more open areas. Interestingly, despite both guilds being insectivorous, aerial feeders demonstrated a strong preference for sites with higher insect inputs, while gleaners had no response (Figure 2).
Figure 2. Scatter plot of response of aerial insectivores (left) compared to response of gleaners (right) to estimated emergent aquatic insect inputs.
Paul hopes that a better understanding of the food resources of aerial insectivores can lead to better conservation measures, and hopefully reverse their long term decline. He will continue his work as a PhD student in the SILVIS lab.
Climate change, fluctuating extreme weather conditions, and the resulting change in species’ abundance and distribution, are a major concern for managers of protected areas. The uncertainty of which species will disappear from a protected area, and which will arrive leads to difficulties in creating conservation goals at both small and large scales. In addition, what role do these protected areas serve during extreme conditions, such as intense heat waves or severe drought, for the species that remain remain? Drs Brooke Bateman, Andrew Allstadt, and Anna Pidgeon have been travelling to meet with managers to show results from their work investigating extreme weather events and changing climate on species populations and distributions. Involving end user and conservation practitioners to provide feedback on their reserach throughout their project is an ideal way to keep their research goals in line with practical on the ground conservation applications and decisions.
Wayne Thogmartin presenting to the group
Dr Bateman and Dr Pidgeon travelled to Chaska, MN to meet with regional United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) personnel during the early stages of their NASA funded project to identify the climate and extreme weather data needs of regional climate managers. The goal was to highlight how such data products can be used for targeted research of climate effects on wildlife at the refuge level. Their next workshop led Dr Bateman to Ft. Collins, CO where she presented the groups findings at the National Planning Workshop of the USFWS. Here, the focus was on broad landscape scale planning for the acquisition of refuges with the aim of buffering wildlife species from climate change related pressures. The trio along with other University of Wisconsin Researchers organized a multi-agency and organization meeting in La Crosse, WI which brought personnel such as the USFWS, Landscape Conservation Cooperative units, United States Geological Survey, the Northeast Climate Science Center, Long Point Waterfowl, as well as Wisconsin and Michigan Department of Natural Resources land managers. This two day workshop included presentations on data and research along with world café style brainstorming sessions to elicit suggestions and feedback from the attendees.. “We found that managers were really interested in maps of climate change and extreme weather for their regions, especially if they showed the uncertainty of the predictions,” said Bateman. The group is trying to keep their finger on the pulse of what data managers are looking for. “Refuge managers really wanted to see predictions specific to their refuge, while regional land managers wanted information at the landscape scale.” This highlights the need to provide data at different spatial scales to meet these various needs.
Project Research participants working with managers of protected areas
As part of a future webpage redesign, data from the project will be available for anyone interested. Users will have the ability to select an area of interest and download relevant data. “We want to always include end users in research, and update our results to meet those needs,” said Batemen. As a result of these workshops, she is currently working on a project using the USFWS designated surrogate species in predictions of species distributions under future changes in climate and extreme weather. These surrogate species were selected as a way to represent other groups of species, such as prairie pothole waterfowl, to provide strategic conservation planning and identify sensitivity of these species as proxies given future change in climate. This is just another way the trio is trying to keep up with the data and research desires of land managers.”
Climate change entails changes in the average and variability of climate conditions. Under future climate change, it is expected that extreme weather events, such as droughts, will become more frequent or more intense, potentially affecting species and biodiversity. Understanding how species respond to extreme weather events is crucial to understand the impact of future environmental change.
Baird’s sparrow
‘Evaluating how species respond to past can help to inform future responses to climate conditions’, says Jessica Gorzo. Jessica is a 3rd-year Ph.D. student at SILVIS. The main goal of Jessica’s research is to model bird population responses to past weather conditions, so to have a tool to predict bird species responses under future climates.Jessica’s study focuses on fourteen grassland birds in Bird Conservation Region (BCR 17). ‘These grasslands are located in a region of high historic climatic variability and with a regular regime of droughts, which makes it an ideal place to understand species responses to extreme weather events,’ Jessica said.
Map of BCR 17
Specifically, Jessica analyzed past population trends derived from the North American Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) between 1980 and 2012 and their relationships with two climate variables, including rainfall variability and temperature variability. Such an analysis requires the use of Bayesian statistics, as a way to best fit hierarchical models incorporating many underlying sources of variation in the data.The findings from this study are quite important. Six of the fourteen bird species showed significant responses to climate variability, particularly to precipitation. ‘Some species increased with increasing precipitation variability, while other decreased’ Jessica said. According to Jessica, the responses she observed are likely to reflect habitat preferences. For example, species that respond positively to precipitation likely need slightly wet conditions, whereas species that respond negatively use drier areas of the grassland.
Landscape of BCR 17
Climate projections suggest that grasslands are expected to see more severe and frequent droughts, and this study provides useful information to gain insights about the future. According to Jessica, species such as Baird’s and grasshopper sparrows, which depend on patches of wet and vigorous vegetation, could see a negative future under climate change, while others may see less competition from the removal of those species. Through this study, Jessica developed key knowledge for understanding species responses to climate conditions. In the near future, and as she advances with her dissertation, these models will serve to inform scientists and managers to prioritize conservation actions and strategies in the face of climate change. “
In the northern region of Yunnan Province, for generations, Tibetan villagers have set aside patches of forest for spiritual proposes, also known as Tibetan sacred forests. During previous research Jodi and Eric discovered that sacred forests are keystone structures for conservation of forest bird in a landscape dominated by degraded pastureland.
Figure 1. Mrs. Gould’s Sunbird (Aethopyga gouldiae), which are often found using Tibetan sacred forests as breeding habitat. (Photo: Eric Wood)
They found more than 30 bird species heavily using sacred forests rather than pastureland. This result highlighted the importance of these forests for bird conservation. After this first study, the next step was to understand what characteristics of these forests make them so attractive for bird? Eric said: ‘In order to effectively manage and conserve bird species in the sacred forests, we need to understand the foundational habitat requirement of these birds. Once we know this, they we can begin to make recommendations for conservation applications. We now know that sacred forests support many bird species, the question that remain is why?’ For this, Jodi and Eric collected field data on habitat structure and composition and bird richness and abundance to construct bird-habitat relationship occupancy models. Some key structural variables that the pair sampled were cover of leaf litter, herbaceous materials, shrubs and trees. These variables are indicators of what species need for survivorship: nesting sites, food, refugee and protection. Once data was collected, and back in the comfort of Madison, Eric developed models to relate the explanatory variables with occupancy of over 30 bird species. With this model-selection approach, it was possible to select best-supported habitat-characteristics associated with a particular species occupancy.
Figure 2 Relationships of predicted sample -point occupancy for six bird species with three habitat characteristics representing the ground and sub-canopy layer. Bird species codes: BLPH & LAPH = Blood and Lady Amherst’s Pheasant, YBBW = Yellowish-bellied Bush Warbler, GILT = Giant Laughingthrush, ELLT = Elliot’s Laughingthrush, CVNH = Chestnut-vented Nuthatch, YUNH = Yunnan Nuthatch.
In addition to the structural variables indicating diverse forested habitats, they found that high cover of leaf litter and shrubs are associated with occupancy of understory birds. While doing fieldwork, they observe that some understory specialist look for their food in the litter, where they can find insects underneath the leaves.
Figure 3. Gray-backed Shrike (Lanius tephronotus), which are often found using degraded habitat adjacent to Tibetan sacred forests. (Photo: Eric Wood)
These result highlighted the importance of field observation. In cases where so little life history information is available, field work become a crucial experience to understand what the models are saying to us afterwards. While China continues to grow in population, there is an increase pressure in resources (e.g., wood, water, and land) in less populated regions, as is the case of Yunnan. In addition to learning more about birds that use Tibetan sacred forests as breeding habitat, the result of this research helps inform future forest management in a regional context.”
Napahai, a high mountain valley wetland in southwest Yunnan Province, is one of three major wintering areas for the Black-necked Crane. With peak counts of the birds at Napahai totaling almost 1,000 birds in the 1960s, the population declined to less than 100 cranes in the 1980s.
Map of China showing the location of Yunnan province, the provincial capital of Kunming and Xiangalila, the Chinese spelling for Shangri-La.
Then, in the early 1980s the creation of water impoundments increased the available habitat for the crane, and the population increased to between 300-500 birds. However, since the mid-1990s, there has been an increase in infrastructure development and agriculture in the valley. While the global population of black-necked cranes has been on the rise over the last 10 years, now estimated at approximately 10,000, the number wintering at Napahai has been steadily declining. Why such a drop in the wintering population? James Burnham along with collaborators from the International Crane Foundation, the Kunming Institute of Zoology, and the University of Strasbourg are trying to find the answer.The reasons for the fluctuating number of Black-necked Cranes observed at Napahai are not straight forward. ‘The expansion of water and agriculture (important foraging and roosting habitat for the cranes) may have helped increase wintering numbers,’ James notes, ‘but further infrastructure development and changing patterns of agriculture may have countered these benefits and reduced Napahai’s utility for wintering Black-necked Cranes.’
A family of Black-necked Cranes and a domestic pig forage in Napahai near one of the several communities that depend on the wetland.
The size of the wetland fluctuates based on local precipitation, which changes the areas available for foraging and roosting, but other changes in the landscape are also in play. Napahai sits at the center of northwest Yunnan’s Deqen County with a population of over 130,000 individuals, predominately ethnic Tibetan and Naxi minorities. The county seat of Shangri-La, renamed in 2001 to entice tourists to this picturesque valley, sits at the edge of Napahai and its development has had dramatic impacts on Napahai.James and his colleagues are employing multiple techniques to investigate these patterns. He uses imagery from the SPOT and QuickBird satellites, which capture high resolution (down to 2.5 m pixel size) imagery to provide pictures of the entire wetland, adjacent uplands and the city of Shangri-La.
Tibetan prayer flags mark one of the overlooks of Napahai, now accessible by a new highway that encircles the wetland.
Based on these images, he is creating highly detailed maps that show the land cover composition of the area. Once those maps are completed, James and his partners will link the observed locations of Black-necked Cranes to these detailed land cover maps and identify which habitats are most important to the birds. James is also attempting to link the fine-scale satellite imagery to Landsat imagery, which does not provide as much detail as the SPOT or Quickbird satellites, but will provide more information about how Napahai has changed since the mid-1980s when economic reforms began to really transform the region. The ultimate goal is to identify how land cover has changed at Napahai, quantify the changes in foraging and roosting habitat and link those patterns with the changes observed in the numbers of Black-necked Cranes wintering in the valley. With that information, James and his colleagues might be able to piece together what is causing the decline in the valley and make concrete recommendations to local resources managers about how to limit, or even reverse, the decline of the cranes of Shangri-La.”
