Incorporating wildlife connectivity into forest plan revision under the United States Forest Service's 2012 planning rule

Matthew A Williamson,Tyler G Creech,Gunnar Carnwath,Virginia Kelly,Beverly Dixon

doi:10.1111/csp2.155

Matthew A Williamson, Tyler G Creech + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1111/csp2.155

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Abstract

AbstractThe United States Forest Service promulgated new planning regulations under the National Forest Management Act in 2012 (i.e., the Planning Rule). These new regulations include the first requirements in U.S. public land management history for National Forests to evaluate, protect, and/or restore ecological connectivity as they revise their land management plans. Data and resource limitations make single‐species, functional connectivity analyses for the myriad species that occur within the 78 million ha the Forest Service manages implausible. We describe an approach that relies on freely available data and generic species, virtual species whose profile consists of ecological requirements designed to reflect the needs of a group of real species, to address the new Planning Rule requirements. We present high‐resolution connectivity estimates for 10 different generic species across a 379,000 ha study area centered on the Custer Gallatin National Forest (CGNF) in Montana and South Dakota under two different movement models. We identify locations important for connectivity for multiple species and characterize the role of the CGNF for regional connectivity. Our results informed the Plan Revision process on the CGNF and could be readily exported to other National Forests currently or planning to revise their land management plans under the new Planning Rule.

Highlights

Ecological connectivity is the degree to which the landscape facilitates or impedes movement among habitatTarget audience: Our target audiences are forest managers, planners, and the researchers that work with them to develop tools for informing decisions.patches
In 2012, the United States Forest Service (USFS) promulgated new planning regulations under the National Forest Management Act (NFMA; 77 FR 21162) that included the first requirements in U.S public land management history for National Forests to evaluate, protect, and/or restore ecological connectivity as the Forests revise their land management plans (i.e., Forest Plans)
We identified potential habitat based on 30-m resolution LANDFIRE Existing Vegetation Type (EVT) version 1.4 geospatial data (U.S Geological Survey, 2014) to classify landscapes pixels into dominant habitat types based on the “EVT Lifeform” attribute in the dataset (Table S1; Figure 2)

Summary

| INTRODUCTION

Target audience: Our target audiences are forest managers, planners, and the researchers that work with them to develop tools for informing decisions. In 2012, the United States Forest Service (USFS) promulgated new planning regulations under the National Forest Management Act (NFMA; 77 FR 21162) that included the first requirements in U.S public land management history for National Forests (the administrative units comprising the National Forest System) to evaluate, protect, and/or restore ecological connectivity as the Forests revise their land management plans (i.e., Forest Plans) These regulations (collectively the Planning Rule) define connectivity as “...ecological conditions that exist at several spatial and temporal scales that provide landscape linkages that permit the exchange of flow, sediments, and nutrients; the daily and seasonal movements of animals within home ranges; the dispersal and genetic interchange between populations; and the long distance range shifts of species, such as in response to climate change” We discuss how our results are informing the current CGNF Plan revision process and consider how this approach might inform similar efforts

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Findings

| DISCUSSION