Abstract
Policy makers and practitioners are in need of useful tools and models for assessing ecosystem service outcomes and the potential risks and opportunities of ecosystem management options. We utilize a state-and-transition model framework integrating dynamic soil and vegetation properties to examine multiple ecosystem services—specifically agricultural production, biodiversity and habitat, and soil health—across human created vegetation states in a managed oak woodland landscape in a Mediterranean climate. We found clear tradeoffs and synergies in management outcomes. Grassland states maximized agricultural productivity at a loss of soil health, biodiversity, and other ecosystem services. Synergies existed among multiple ecosystem services in savanna and woodland states with significantly larger nutrient pools, more diversity and native plant richness, and less invasive species. This integrative approach can be adapted to a diversity of working landscapes to provide useful information for science-based ecosystem service valuations, conservation decision making, and management effectiveness assessments.
Highlights
For over a decade, science and policy efforts have increasingly focused on valuing and preserving ecosystem services—the collective benefits humanity obtains from the environment [1]
This study was conducted at the University of California Sierra Foothill Research and Extension Center (SFREC) in Yuba County, California, US (Fig 1)
We utilized a suite of dynamic vegetation and soil metrics within an state and transition models (STM) framework to link management decisions with ecosystem service outcomes
Summary
Science and policy efforts have increasingly focused on valuing and preserving ecosystem services—the collective benefits humanity obtains from the environment [1]. Considerable challenges—including climate change, increasing resource needs driven by growing human population, changing fire regimes and land use conversion—remain for delivering ecosystem services [8,9,10]. For working landscapes such as grazed rangelands and managed forest lands, there are two high priority areas: 1) linking management decisions with on-the-ground measures of ecosystem service outcomes; and 2) quantifying tradeoffs and synergies among multiple ecosystem services under different land management options [2, 9, 11,12,13].
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