Restoring Mixed Grass Prairie in Southeastern Alberta, Canada

Downey, Brad A.; Jones, Patricia S.; Blouin, François.; Richman, Jennifer D.; Downey, Brandy L.

doi:10.2111/rangelands-d-12-00082.1

Cited by 8 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 9 publications

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“…An alternative to protected areas that encompass intact grasslands would be to conserve working rangelands and reward private landowners for the ecosystem goods and services (Jones, Downey, et al, 2019). In addition, the allocation of funds to expand this land base via restoration practices (Downey et al, 2013) will be required, as this landscape is home to many declining species for which their currently available habitats fail to produce the templates necessary for recovery. Finer-scale products could help guide practitioners to areas for implementing projects demonstrated to alleviate known threats to species (e.g., MacDonald et al, 2022).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Grassland intactness outcompetes species as a more efficient surrogate in conservation design

Tack,

Jakes,

Jones

et al. 2023

Conservat Sci and Prac

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Mapped representations of species−habitat relationships often underlie approaches to prioritize area‐based conservation strategies to meet conservation goals for biodiversity. Generally a single surrogate species is used to inform conservation design, with the assumption that conservation actions for an appropriately selected species will confer benefits to a broader community of organisms. Emerging conservation frameworks across western North America are now relying on derived measures of intactness from remotely sensed vegetation data, wholly independent from species data. Understanding the efficacy of species‐agnostic planning approaches is a critical step to ensuring the robustness of emerging conservation designs. We developed an approach to quantify ‘strength of surrogacy’, by applying prioritization algorithms to previously developed species models, and measuring their coverage provided to a broader wildlife community. We used this inference to test the relative surrogacy among a suite of species models used for conservation targeting in the endangered grasslands of the Northern Sagebrush Steppe, where careful planning can help stem the loss of private grazing lands to cultivation. In this test, we also derived a simpler surrogate of intact rangelands without species data for conservation targeting, along with a measure of combined migration representative of key areas for connectivity. Our measure of intactness vastly outperformed any species model as a surrogate for conservation, followed by that of combined migration, highlighting the efficacy of strategies that target large and intact rangeland cores for wildlife conservation and restoration efforts.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Grassland intactness outcompetes species as a more efficient surrogate in conservation design

Tack,

Jakes,

Jones

et al. 2023

Conservat Sci and Prac

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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Pronghorn

Jones,

Reinking,

Jakes

et al. 2023

Rangeland Wildlife Ecology and Conservation

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Pronghorn (Antilocapra americana) are an endemic ungulate in western North America and occupy rangelands concurrently with domestic livestock. When rangelands are in healthy condition, there is little-to-no competition between pronghorn and domestic livestock. When rangeland health deteriorates, direct competition occurs when both compete for limited resources. Pronghorn are a highly mobile species that cope with challenging environmental conditions (both natural and human-imposed) through daily and seasonal movements to more favorable habitats. Maintaining healthy rangelands and rangeland connectivity will allow pronghorn to move freely and adapt to increased human disturbance. In addition, understanding the cumulative effects and identifying mitigation strategies of deleterious anthropogenic effects (i.e., habitat conversion, linear features, energy development, and climate changes) will help to ensure long-term persistence of pronghorn populations. Mitigation will be critical, in conjunction with expanded research efforts, to help gain a greater knowledge of the role of environmental conditions and anthropogenic disturbances on pronghorn fitness, persistence, and their ability to move across the land in response to an ever-changing landscape.

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Importance of species diversity in the revegetation of Alberta’s northern fescue prairies

Woosaree¹,

Otfinowski

2017

Biodivers Conserv

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Restoring Mixed Grass Prairie in Southeastern Alberta, Canada

Cited by 8 publications

References 9 publications

Grassland intactness outcompetes species as a more efficient surrogate in conservation design

Grassland intactness outcompetes species as a more efficient surrogate in conservation design

Pronghorn

Importance of species diversity in the revegetation of Alberta’s northern fescue prairies

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