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MAPPING
BIODIVERSITY METRICS REPRESENTING ECOSYSTEM SERVICES AT |
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It is widely understood
that the human condition is intrinsically linked to the quality of the
environment and the services it provides. Ecosystem services, i.e.,
"services provided to humans from natural systems," have become a
key issue of this century in resource management, conservation, human
well-being, and environmental decision analysis. Mapping and quantifying
ecosystem services have become strategic national interests for integrating
ecology with economics to help explain the effects of human policies and the
subsequent impacts on both ecosystem function and human welfare. Aspects of
biodiversity are valued by humans in many ways, and thus are important to
include in any assessment that seeks to identify and quantify the value of
ecosystems to humans. Some biodiversity metrics clearly reflect ecosystem
services (e.g., abundance and diversity of game species), whereas others
reflect indirect and difficult to quantify relationships to services (e.g.,
relevance of species diversity to ecosystem resilience, cultural value of
native species). Wildlife habitat has been modeled at broad spatial scales
and can be used to map a number of biodiversity metrics. In this project, we
are using USGS Gap Analysis Program data including land cover, land
stewardship, and deductive habitat models for terrestrial vertebrate species
to map metrics reflecting ecosystem services or biodiversity aspects valued
by humans over large areas. Metrics are derived from
species-of-greatest-conservation-need, threatened and endangered species,
harvestable species (i.e., upland game, big game), total species richness,
and taxon richness. The project is being conducted
at multiple scales in a phased approach, i.e. place-based watersheds (San
Pedro, Tampa Bay, Albemarle-Pamlico) to multi-state regional areas (Southwest
and Southeast) that eventually will culminate in a national-level Sustainable
Atlas of Ecosystem Services developed by the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency for the conterminous U.S. |
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