Mapping and prioritizing seasonal habitats for greater sage‐grouse in Northwestern Colorado

Abstract

Delineating and prioritizing areas where wildlife occur on a seasonal basis is critical for successful conservation and management of at-risk populations. Many local populations of greater sagegrouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) are of conservation concern in western North America because of continuing habitat loss and degradation caused by changing land use. To manage populations, wildlife managers need accurate, high-resolution maps of different seasonal habitats, guidelines for managing habitat at landscape scales, and quantitative tools to inform habitat prioritization and management. We conducted population-level, multi-scale, resource selection function (RSF) analyses with generalized estimating equations (GEE) using locations from 2006 to 2010 to model and map greater sage-grouse seasonal habitats in the Parachute-Piceance-Roan population in northwestern Colorado. Areas selected by greater sage-grouse in all seasons had a mix of habitats with a sagebrush component, less rugged topography, and less nonsagebrush habitat. Selection or avoidance of most vegetation classes was best supported at the 100-m or 400-m scale in all seasons. Birds selected sagebrush and sagebrush-grassland at intermediate elevations during breeding and winter and more diverse sagebrush habitats at higher elevations in summer and fall. Absolute validation index (AVI) analyses indicated that although most use locations were concentrated within a highly restricted portion of the study area in each season, a much larger proportion of the study area was required to encompass seasonal use locations for most individuals in the population. Our study illustrates the utility of multi-scale RSF analyses with GEE for accurately mapping habitat and AVI analyses for informing prioritization efforts for populations of greater sage-grouse. Ó

Approaches to delineate greater sage‐grouse winter concentration areas

“…Sage‐grouse selected landscapes that were less rugged with warmer aspects dominated by sagebrush. These findings were generally consistent with previous winter sage‐grouse research (Carpenter et al ; Smith et al , ; Holloran et al ; Walker et al ). Sage‐grouse also selected winter habitats closer to leks and in areas with greater breeding densities (as indexed by male lek counts) within 11.1 km of known leks.…”

“…Even short-distance migrants require connectivity among seasonal habitats for adequate conservation (Sawyer et al 2009, Copeland et al 2014). Species of concern may require a variety of seasonal habitats to support their life-history characteristics, which suggests that conserving wildlife with protected areas requires comprehensive knowledge of the spatial distribution, arrangement, and components of seasonal habitats of focal species (Simberloff and Abele 1976, Johnson et al 2004, Walker et al 2016.…”

Dual‐frame lek surveys for estimating greater sage‐grouse populations

“…The 1,466-km 2 area is composed of a series of ridges and plateaus separated by drainages at elevations from 2,150 m to 2,750 m. Primary land uses included seasonal livestock grazing and big game hunting, and year-round natural gas development. At the time of our study, sage-grouse in the PPR represented approximately 4% of the males counted in Colorado (CGSSC 2008) and occupied mountain big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata vaseyana) and mixed sagebrush-mountain shrub communities on ridges, plateaus, and the upper ends of drainages (Krager 1977, Hagen 1999, CGSSC 2008, Walker et al 2016. Seasons in the PPR are characterized by cold winters with deep snowpack ( x ¼ 155 cm/year; Colorado Climate Center data) and mild summers.…”

Assessing Greater Sage-Grouse Selection of Brood-Rearing Habitat Using Remotely-Sensed Imagery: Can Readily Available High-Resolution Imagery Be Used to Identify Brood-Rearing Habitat Across a Broad Landscape?

“…Studies at these small spatial extents largely shaped contemporary management practices meant to increase quality of brood-rearing habitat. More recently, the focus has shifted to the landscape spatial extent [ 18 , 30 – 31 , 32 – 34 ]. With annual home ranges that can be as large as 600 km 2 , examining characteristics of brood-rearing habitat at larger spatial extents is warranted [ 16 , 35 – 36 ].…”