OUTDATED Indicator V 2.0: Pine & Prairie - Pine and Prairie Amphibians

Pine and Prairie Amphibians
This layer is an outdated version of one of the South Atlantic LCC indicators in the pine woodland, savanna and prairie ecosystem. It captures Priority Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Areas in the pine and prairie ecosystem. This indicator was updated in Blueprint 2.1 to extend it to new areas of the pine and prairie ecosystem map.

Reason for Selection
Amphibians provide an indicator of the condition and arrangement of embedded isolated wetlands.

Input Data
South Atlantic LCC Priority Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Areas (PARCAs) served as input data for this indicator. PARCAs are a nonregulatory designation whose purpose is to raise public awareness and spark voluntary action by landowners and conservation partners to benefit amphibians and/or reptiles. Areas are nominated using scientific criteria and expert review, drawing on the concepts of species rarity, richness, regional responsibility, and landscape integrity. Modeled in part after the Important Bird Areas program developed by BirdLife International, PARCAs are intended to be nationally coordinated but locally implemented at state or regional scales. Importantly, PARCAs are not designed to compete with existing landscape biodiversity initiatives, but to complement them, providing an additional spatially explicit layer for conservation consideration.

PARCAs are intended to be established in areas:
--capable of supporting viable amphibian and reptile populations,
--occupied by rare, imperiled, or at-risk species, and
--rich in species diversity or endemism.

There are four major implementation steps:

1) Regional PARC task teams or state experts can use the criteria and modify them when appropriate to designate potential PARCAs in their area of interest.

2) Following the identification of all potential PARCAs, the group then reduces these to a final set of exceptional sites that best represent the area of interest.

3) Experts and stakeholders in the area of interest collaborate to produce a map that identifies these peer-reviewed PARCAs.

4) Final PARCAs are shared with the community to encourage the implementation of voluntary habitat management and conservation efforts. PARCA boundaries can be updated as needed.

Mapping Steps
Indicators used in Blueprint 2.0 were initially computed, or in the case of existing data, were resampled to 1 ha spatial resolution using the nearest neighbor method. For computational reasons, we then used the Spatial Analyst aggregate function to rescale the resolution to 200 m. The aggregate function avoided loss of detail by taking the maximum value of each cell in the conversion (e.g., species presence).

PARCAs were clipped to the area mapped as pine woodland, savanna and prairie in Conservation Blueprint 2.0. Indicator values were assigned as follows:

0 = Not a Priority Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Area (PARCA) within pine and prairie
1 = Priority Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Area (PARCA) within pine and prairie

Defining the Spatial Extent of Ecosystems
This indicator has been clipped to the pine and prairie ecosystem. Visit the Blueprint 2.0 ecosystem maps page for an explanation of how each ecosystem’s spatial extent is defined.

Known Issues
-- The mapping of this indicator is relatively coarse and doesn’t always capture differences in pixel-level quality in the outer edge of PARCAs.
-- This indicator is binary and doesn’t capture the full continuum of value across the South Atlantic.
-- The methods of combining expert knowledge and data in this indicator may have caused some areas that are poorly known and/or under-surveyed to be scored too low.

Indicator Overview
The South Atlantic ecosystem indicators serve as the South Atlantic LCC's metrics of success and drive the identification of priority areas for shared action in the Conservation Blueprint. To learn more about the indicators and how they are being used, please visit the indicator page. Check out the Blueprint page for more information on the development of the Blueprint, a living spatial plan to conserve our natural and cultural resources.

Literature Cited
Sutherland and deMaynadier. 2012. Model Criteria and Implementation Guidance for a Priority Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Area (PARCA) System in the USA. Partners in Amphibian and Reptile Conservation, Technical Publication PARCA-1. 28 pp. < http://www.parcplace.org/images/stories/documents/PARCA_System_Criteria_and_Implementation_Guidance_FINAL.pdf>

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OUTDATED Indicator V 2.0: Pine & Prairie - Pine and Prairie Amphibians

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