Multi‐attribute preferences for northern bobwhite habitat restoration among Texas landowners

Abstract

ABSTRACTNorthern bobwhite (Colinus virginianus) abundance has declined range‐wide over the long term due to factors such as habitat loss and deterioration. Private land management is critical to bobwhite conservation because most bobwhites occur on private lands, but little research has been conducted regarding how private land managers and landowners make decisions about whether and how to restore northern bobwhite habitat. To begin addressing this deficit, we used a choice‐based conjoint approach to determine how Texas, USA, landowners and land managers (surveyed in November 2017) weigh the importance of northern bobwhite hunting opportunities, costs, and labor when making habitat restoration decisions. We also used a latent class analysis to break respondents into segments based on their valuations of these attributes. The results of our latent class analysis indicate that managers and landowners can be grouped into several segments, and most segments do not place a high value on bobwhite hunting opportunities, but instead are more interested in minimizing out‐of‐pocket costs and labor input. Bobwhite habitat restoration programs yielding cost shares ≥50%, labor inputs at ≤30 days/year, and likely coveys flushed per hunting day >4 broadly appealed to landowners; however, ensuring low labor costs was most important, particularly for pragmatic landowners. This indicates that policies minimizing labor inputs and maximizing cost shares may be preferred over increasing hunting opportunities. Finally, we discuss the management preferences and practices of the segment most interested in maximizing bobwhite hunting opportunities and potential outreach strategies for segments of opportunistic and pragmatic landowners who may be persuaded to manage for bobwhite habitat if they perceived this management as economically viable. © 2019 The Authors. Wildlife Society Bulletin Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.