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The Prairie Pothole Region (PPR) of the north-central U.S. and south-central Canada contains millions of small prairie wetlands that provide critical habitat to many migrating and breeding waterbirds. Due to their small size and the relatively dry climate of the region, these wetlands are considered at high risk for negative climate change effects as temperatures increase. To estimate the potential impacts of climate change on breeding waterbirds, we predicted current and future distributions of species common in the PPR using species distribution models (SDMs). We created regional-scale SDMs for the U.S. PPR using Breeding Bird Survey occurrence records for 1971–2011 and wetland, upland, and climate variables....
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The project will utilize a 4.5 million acre study area on the Montana Glaciated Plains. The objectives are to (1) identify environmental conditions and management practices that will maintain habitat for grassland birds but not impact ranching sustainability, and (2) identify areas on the landscape that have the greatest conservation potential for grassland birds. This spatial analysis will provide the framework for a rigorous assessment of management actions on the Montana Glaciated Plains.
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Map drained wetland basins in the PPR of Iowa and complete data set for the eastern (Region 3) of the U.S. Prairie Pothole Regionl. These data form the foundation for a newly launced inititative to develop an “Integrated Conservation Design Strategy for the PPR of Minnesota and Iowa.” This new initiative integrates wildlife habitat, water quality and flood attenuation objectives with wetland restoration potential maps to develop multi-objective wetland restoration plans for landscape-scale watershed.
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Rapid expansion of cropland threatens grassland ecosystems across western North America and broad-scaleplanning can be a catalyst motivating individuals and agencies to accelerate conservation. Sprague’s Pipit(Anthus spragueii) is an imperiled grassland songbird whose population has been declining rapidly in recent decades.Here, we present a strategic framework for conservation of pipits and their habitat in the northern GreatPlains.We modeled pipit distribution across its million-km2 breeding range in Canada and the U.S.We describefactors shaping distribution, delineate population cores and assess vulnerability to future grassland losses. Pipitsselected landscapes with a high proportion of continuous grassland...
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The Matador Ranch Grassbank is the most successful grassbank in the country, annually incentivizing conservation actions on over 200,000 acres of participating ranches. Incentives for management actions are in the form of discounts, which reduce the cost of leased grazing at the Matador Ranch. One of the required discounts for participating in the grassbank is a ranch management plan that guides grazing and benefits natural communities and the wildlife dependent upon them. This report details the results of our work to assess resource conditions and craft management plans with eight ranches on over 113,000 acres. Our analysis found that overall ranches implemented grazing management practices that maintained ecological...
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This report provides a final update of work performed for the period beginning December 20, 2010 and ending December 31, 2012. The report describes two umbrella projects: (1) to improve fish passage and landscape connectivity for native species and 2) to determine the thermal effects on fish species sensitive to climate change. The work was performed through a partnership led by the Western Transportation Institute at Montana State University and the Bozeman Fish Technology Center (BFTC) of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. The report is divided into five chapters that provide details on accomplishments to meet specific objectives outlined in our proposal during the period. Several of the projects that...
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Comprehensive wetland inventories are an essential tool for wetland management, but developing and maintaining an inventory is expensive and technically challenging. Funding for these efforts has also been problematic. Here we describe a large-area application of a semi-automated processused to update a wetland inventory for east-central Minnesota. The original inventory for this area was the product of a laborintensive, manual photo-interpretation process. The present application incorporated high resolution, multi-spectral imagery from multiple seasons; high resolution elevation data derived from lidar; satellite radar imagery; and other GIS data. Map production combined image segmentation and random forest classification...
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The habitats and food resources required to support breeding and migrant birds dependent on North American prairie wetlands are threatened by impending climate change. The North American Prairie Pothole Region (PPR) hosts nearly 120 species of wetland-dependent birds representing 21 families. Strategic management requires knowledge of avian habitat requirements and assessment of species most vulnerable to future threats. We applied bioclimatic species distribution models (SDMs) to project range changes of 29 wetland-dependent bird species using ensemble modeling techniques, a large number of General Circulation Models (GCMs), and hydrological climate covariates. For the U.S. PPR, mean projected range change, expressed...
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As a major threat to global biodiversity, climate change will alter where and how we manage conservation lands (e.g., parks, refuges, wildlife management areas, natural areas). As a new challenge with high uncertainty, many conservation practitioners have yet to consider how to minimize their greenhouse gas contributions (i.e., mitigation), or reduce the vulnerability of natural systems to climatechange (i.e., adaptation). This is particularly true for conservation land managers; because they are often pressed for time and resources, few have initiated long-term climate change planning and amended management activities. Furthermore, where available, climate change guidance is often coarse-level, vague, and beyond...
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As a major threat to global biodiversity, climate change will alter where and how we manage conservation lands (e.g., parks, refuges, wildlife management areas, natural areas). As a new challenge with high uncertainty, many conservation practitioners have yet to consider how to minimize their greenhouse gas contributions (i.e., mitigation), or reduce the vulnerability of natural systems to climate change (i.e., adaptation). This is particularly true for conservation land managers; because they are often pressed for time and resources, few have initiated long-term climate change planning and amended management activities. Furthermore, where available, climate change guidance is often coarse-level, vague, and beyond...
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The concept of adaptive management provides a set of good business principles to guide strategic habitat conservation, but these principles are only useful if they are put into practice through a complimentary set of business operations. To that end, if conservation is going to be successful operating at landscape scales, the conservation community must start thinking and functioning like a conservation enterprise. Much more emphasis must be placed on developing and supporting business operations that facilitate the flow of information and other resources at landscape scales. Just like successful national and global businesses, we need to develop an information supply chain to support the communication, coordination,...
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Natural resource agencies in the Upper Midwest are facing difficult decisions concerning how to effectively support climate change adaptation and prepare managers for current and future stressors. An initial aspect of this project resulted in completion of a report: Management Options for Conservation Lands in an Era of Climate Change, in which the authors examine the current literature on climate change adaptation objectives, strategies, and actions that are feasible to implement in ecosystems of the Upper Midwest and Great Lakes. Yet, there is limited understanding of the factors that constrain and promote climate change adaptation by local land managers. We utilized a mixed-methods approach, which included a...
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Identifying the climatic drivers of an ecological system is a key step in assessing its vulnerability to climate change. Theclimatic dimensions to which a species or system is most sensitive – such as means or extremes – can guide methodologicaldecisions for projections of ecological impacts and vulnerabilities. However, scientific workflows for combining climateprojections with ecological models have received little explicit attention. We review Global Climate Model (GCM)performance along different dimensions of change and compare frameworks for integrating GCM output into ecologicalmodels. In systems sensitive to climatological means, it is straightforward to base ecological impact assessments onmean projected...
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Oil development in the Bakken shale region has increased rapidly as a result of new technologies and strongdemand for fossil fuel. This region also supports a particularly high density and diversity of grassland bird species,which are declining across North America. We examined grassland bird response to unconventional oilextraction sites (i.e. developed with hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling techniques) and associatedroads in North Dakota. Our goal was to quantify the amount of habitat that was indirectly degraded by oil development,as evidenced by patterns of avoidance by birds. Grassland birds avoided areas within 150 m of roads(95% CI: 87–214 m), 267 m of single-bore well pads (95% CI: 157–378 m),...
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This project will develop species distribution models (SDM) to evaluate current and future occurrence and density of wetland-dependent birds relative to several predictors, including land use patterns, wetland condition and connectivity, geomorphic setting and climate. These tools will suggest which wetland-dependent bird species appear most vulnerable to climate and land use change based on the expected extent of range change under various scenarios. Knowledge of natural history and habitat associations of species coupled with coefficients from regression models will provide insight into the potential reasons for species vulnerability. This information will be valuable in the development of management strategies.
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Temperate grasslands are among earth’s most imperiled ecosystems. In North America,steep declines of endemic songbird populations indicate that grassland loss and degradation may be approaching critical levels. Grasslands are agricultural landscapes largely (~85%) under private ownership with little formal protection status. Remaining bird populations depend on grazing lands that have not been converted to cropland. We combine regional data from a hotspot for grassland bird diversity (northeast Montana,USA; 26,500-km2) with continental data spanning the northern Great Plains (1,000,000- km2) to evaluate how land use and management influence bird distribution and abundance. Regionally, habitat used by seven grassland...
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In total this project has developed digital wetland inventory and habitat data for ten counties within and around the Great Lakes watershed of Wisconsin. Digital data has now been completed for the following counties: Sawyer, Sauk, Barron, Polk, Langlade, Menominee, Price, Shawano, Taylor, and Winnebago.
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Map drained wetland basins in the PPR of Iowa and complete data set for the eastern (Region 3) of the U.S. Prairie Pothole Regionl. These data form the foundation for a newly launced inititative to develop an “Integrated Conservation Design Strategy for the PPR of Minnesota and Iowa.” This new initiative integrates wildlife habitat, water quality and flood attenuation objectives with wetland restoration potential maps to develop multi-objective wetland restoration plans for landscape-scale watershed.
map background search result map search result map Developing a Portfolio of Mitigation and Adaption Options for Land Managers in the Upper Great Lakes Capture of Down-Scale Climate Change Models. Part B: The Application of High Resolution Climate Models for Avian Conservation Capture and interpretation of down-scaled climate change models to benefit avian conservation Iowa Wetland Assessment and Restorable Wetland Inventory: Improving Wetland Restoration Planning Through Processing of Recently Collected LIDAR data for the Prairie Pothole Region of Iowa Grassland Bird Conservation on Working Landscapes: Spatial analysis linking populations to habitat Predicting Bird and Bat Fatality Risk at Wind Farms and Proposed Wind Farm Sites Using Acoustic Ultrasonic Recorders Report: Great Lakes Information Management and Delivery System Report: Management Options for Conservation Lands in an Era of Climate Change Report: Barriers and Opportunities to Managing for Disturbance and Environmental Change in the Upper Midwest Publication: A Semi-Automated, Multi-Source Data Fusion Update of aWetland Inventory for East-Central Minnesota Report: Digital Conversion of Updated Wisconsin Wetland Inventory Implications of climate change for wetland-dependent birds in the Prairie Potholes Region Vulnerability of Breeding Waterbirds to Climate Change in the Prairie Pothole Region Designing ecological climate change impact assessments to reflect key climatic drivers Fish Passage in Plains and Prairie Waterways report Report: Assessing and Implementing Ranch Management Planning at Scale through the Matador Ranch Grassbank Cows and Plows: Science-based Conservation for Grassland Songbirds in Agricultural Landscapes One step ahead of the plow: Using cropland conversion risk to guide Sprague's Pipit conservation in the northern Great Plains Iowa Wetland Assessment and Restorable Wetland Inventory Phase-I Report Avoidance of unconventional oil wells and roads exacerbates habitat loss for grassland birds in the North American great plains Avoidance of unconventional oil wells and roads exacerbates habitat loss for grassland birds in the North American great plains Iowa Wetland Assessment and Restorable Wetland Inventory: Improving Wetland Restoration Planning Through Processing of Recently Collected LIDAR data for the Prairie Pothole Region of Iowa Iowa Wetland Assessment and Restorable Wetland Inventory Phase-I Report Publication: A Semi-Automated, Multi-Source Data Fusion Update of aWetland Inventory for East-Central Minnesota Grassland Bird Conservation on Working Landscapes: Spatial analysis linking populations to habitat Report: Assessing and Implementing Ranch Management Planning at Scale through the Matador Ranch Grassbank Cows and Plows: Science-based Conservation for Grassland Songbirds in Agricultural Landscapes One step ahead of the plow: Using cropland conversion risk to guide Sprague's Pipit conservation in the northern Great Plains Report: Digital Conversion of Updated Wisconsin Wetland Inventory Developing a Portfolio of Mitigation and Adaption Options for Land Managers in the Upper Great Lakes Report: Management Options for Conservation Lands in an Era of Climate Change Report: Barriers and Opportunities to Managing for Disturbance and Environmental Change in the Upper Midwest Capture of Down-Scale Climate Change Models. Part B: The Application of High Resolution Climate Models for Avian Conservation Capture and interpretation of down-scaled climate change models to benefit avian conservation Predicting Bird and Bat Fatality Risk at Wind Farms and Proposed Wind Farm Sites Using Acoustic Ultrasonic Recorders Implications of climate change for wetland-dependent birds in the Prairie Potholes Region Vulnerability of Breeding Waterbirds to Climate Change in the Prairie Pothole Region Designing ecological climate change impact assessments to reflect key climatic drivers Fish Passage in Plains and Prairie Waterways report Report: Great Lakes Information Management and Delivery System