A website with links to the Landscape Conservation Cooperative (LCC) Integrated Data Management Network (IDMN) final report as well as individual LCC websites. The IDMN worked with over 20 organizations over two years to bring coherence to the LCC information management landscape. Specifically, the IDMN Network tried to address ways LCC partners implemented the basic building blocks of data management. Issues addressed included building and sharing science products with partners, securely storing those data for the long term, and evaluating ways to get those outputs to cooperators and eventually the public. Over the course of the IDMN project, the scope was expanded to address ways to track projects that produced...
Concerns about the influence of climate change on biota have emerged over the past decade, and responses in species populations and distribution patterns have already been documented (Parmesan 1996, Thomas and Lennon 1999). Current climates and communities will not simply migrate, but rather will re-form in novel ways over time (Fox 2007; Hunter et al. 1988; Williams and Jackson 2007). Due to the uncertainty of future climatic patterns and species responses, enduring features of the landscape (geophysical settings) are appropriate targets of assessment, planning, and conservation (Anderson and Ferree 2010, Beier and Brost 2010, Brost and Beier 2012; Hunter et al. 1988). Only recently have enduring features been...
This work provides a flexible and scalable framework to assess the impacts of climate change on streamflow and stream temperature within the North Atlantic Landscape Conservation Cooperative (NALCC) region. This is accomplished through use of lumped parameter, physically-based, conceptual hydrologic and stream temperature models formulated in a hierarchical Bayesian framework. This allows for model predictions of streamflow and temperature at ungaged locations and a formal accounting of model estimate uncertainty at each location, something not previously achieved in these models. These environmental models will also link seamlessly with the land use and fish models. The final products of this project will provide:...
This guidebook is intended to provide a practical overview of climate envelope modeling for conservation professionals and natural resource managers. The material is intended for people with little background or experience in climate envelope modeling who want to better understand and interpret models developed by others and the results generated by such models, or want to do some modeling themselves. This is not an exhaustive review of climate envelope modeling, but rather a brief introduction to some key concepts in the discipline. Here we treat selected topics from a practical perspective, using minimal jargon to explain and illustrate some of the many issues that one has to be aware of when using climate envelope...
Successful conservation strategies in the face of climate change will require careful consideration of how changing climate will affect wildlife and habitats. Development of innovative, data driven, accessible tools will assist in understanding and planning for those effects. This document serves the final report for U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) project # F11AC00028 that provides tools that enhance the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (and others) climate change toolbox. This project was funded to (1) develop climate envelope models and associated prediction maps for 26 federally threatened and endangered terrestrial (T&E) vertebrate species occurring in peninsular Florida; (2) provide a technical guidebook...
Landscape Conservation Cooperatives are public-private partnerships composed of federal, state, and local governments, Tribes and First Nations, non-governmental organizations, universities, interested public and private organizations, international jurisdictions, and others working together to address landscape and seascape scale conservation issues. However, numerous approaches to landscape conservation design (LCD) exist and the nuances among these efforts makes integration of LCD with other planning efforts and products, both within and across Landscape Conservation Cooperative boundaries, a challenge. We reviewed and synthesized information on LCD projects in the eastern United States to better understand challenges...
Natural Resource Data Analysis Tools include virtual tools and systems used to visualize and analyze data for natural resource management and landscape analysis. These cataloged tools were identified by the Toolshed Team, which is a member of the Integrated Data Management Network (IDMN). IDMN was tasked with identifying and advancing tools deemed useful for natural resource management activities of various Landscape Conservation Cooperatives.
This website provides information about the National Stream Internet, which had two goals: 1) refine key spatial and statistical stream software and digital databases for compatibility so that a nationally consistent analytical infrastructure exists and is easy to apply; and 2) engage a grassroots user-base in application of this infrastructure so they are empowered to create new and valuable information from stream databases anywhere in the country. This website is a hub designed to connect users with software, data, and tools for creating that information. The website can be found at: https://www.fs.fed.us/rm/boise/AWAE/projects/NationalStreamInternet.html.
Landscape Conservation Cooperatives (LCCs) have a critical need for information management processes that facilitate science product (i.e., data, analysis and decision tools, documents) sharing; data storage, security, and dissemination; and project tracking, communication and collaboration tools (Arctic LCC 2010, North Atlantic LCC 2011, Southern Rockies LCC 2011, California LCC 2011). LCCs and their partners are already developing and using a wide variety of data management systems to address LCC and project needs, but the LCC Network and all partners need better coordination across these efforts to develop and share common standards and services, improving the intellectual exchange needed to achieve the LCC mission....
The use of digital information to aid in land management decision making has become a standardized practice over the last 20 years. However, gathering this information for regional and national level analysis is problematic due to the number of organizations holding and gathering data along with compatibility issues within the data. Protected lands are a key component to landscape conservation efforts of the LCC’s and are also one of the keys to developing a response to climate change impacts. Many efforts, such as the Protected Areas Database (PAD) created by the Conservation Biology Institute and USGS have been undertaken, but these have largely focused on lands conserved in fee. The National Conservation Easement...
This report contains research results and products compiled in the course of the comprehensive review project Systematic review of aquatic ecological integrity assessments in western North America: Identifying challenges and opportunities for integration into landscape conservation plans. Some of these results have been accepted in a peer-reviewed journal (Section 1), others are in preparation for a peer-review submission (Section II). The two remaining sections (III and IV) may contribute to additional peer reviewed publications in the future, but at this time are summarized solely in this report and as background material for the peer-reviewed articles as well as a web report entitled “Assessment of ecological...
As a result of this project, 14,137 new easements from 413 holders were added to the National Conservation Easement Database; this represents a 16% increase in number of easements in the Database. Most of these easements were from local governments and NGOs. More than 600 easements were digitized, making them available for planning and analysis purposes. More than 3,000 easements were updated to correct information such as boundaries. Significant outreach to the LCC community was made through personal contact and a webinar; all LCC’s now have access to the National Conservation Easement Database, which includes more than 100,000 easements protecting 20 million acres. Improvements in communication and standardization...
As climate change progresses and stressors to biodiversity continue to expand across the landscape, conservation actions need to be increasingly targeted and effective. Past and current efforts put more weight on investments in conservation application with less attention to monitoring the outcome and refining the approach. The inception of the Landscape Conservation Cooperatives provided a timely opportunity to refine our approach to conservation in a way that maximizes return on investment to maintain important natural resources and ecosystems for future generations. The conservation community lags behind other sectors in evaluating the efficacy of their actions. For example, the concept of “business excellence”...
The National Stream Internet (NSI) project was funded by the LCC program and led by researchers from USFS, CSIRO, NOAA, and USGS. The project developed a national analytical infrastructure for stream data that can be applied consistently anywhere in the country to develop new information at low cost. To create that infrastructure, the NSI project developed compatibility among key digital stream geospatial data and analysis tools. Those included the EPA/USGS NHD-Plus v.2 stream hydrography layer, sets of stream reach descriptors, and tools for implementing spatial statistical network models. The NSI enables consistent application of sophisticated analysis tools to many types of stream data throughout the U.S. Moreover,...
Successful conservation strategies in the face of climate change will require careful consideration of how changing climate will affect wildlife and habitats. Development of innovative, data-driven, accessible tools will assist in understanding and planning for those effects. This project was funded to (1) develop climate envelope models and associated prediction maps for 26 federally threatened and endangered terrestrial (T&E) vertebrate species occurring in peninsular Florida, (2) provide a technical guidebook for use and interpretation of climate envelope models, (3) develop visualization and social networking tools that will allow natural resource managers and the general public to view our models, and (4) create...
As conservation increases its emphasis on implementing change at landscape-level scales, multiagency, cross-boundary, and multi-stakeholder networks become more important. These elements complicate traditional notions of learning. To investigate this further, we examined structures of learning in the Landscape Conservation Cooperatives (LCCs), which include the entire US and its territories, as well as parts of Canada, Mexico, and Caribbean and Pacific island states. We used semi-structured interviews, transcribed and analyzed using NVivo, as well as a charrette-style workshop to understand the difference between the original stated goals of individual LCCs and the values and purposes expressed as the collaboration...
The National Conservation Easement Database team produced a webinar on the National Conservation Easement Database. The webinar took place on November 14th, 2013 and had 113 people from 48 different organizations sign up, of which 69 attended (including 6 from the FWS). The session was recorded and will be used in the future as an outreach tool. The project added 14,137 new easements from 413 holders to the National Conservation Easement Database; representing a 16% increase in number of easements in the Database. Most of these easements were from local governments and NGOs. More than 600 easements were digitized, making them available for planning and analysis purposes. More than 3,000 easements were updated to...
This project was funded to understand how, where, and why outputs from landscape connectivity models vary, and to suggest approaches to increase comparability and interoperability of models across Landscape Conservation Cooperative boundaries. We began by compiling metadata from 73 landscape connectivity modeling projects into an online, editable spreadsheet. Using spatial data from a subset of studies included in the database, we conducted an uncertainty analysis to understand how much spatial variation there was among predictions from different landscape connectivity models. Raw outputs from the original models showed relatively little overlap, averaging about 3% across all pairs of studies. However, when a common...
