Conservation Internationalbiodiversity mapping initiatives

Who are CABS-CI?

Why map biodiversity?

What initiatives exist?

Conservation International

Founded: 1987

FY99 turnover: $85m

Field programs: 30 countries worldwide

Staff: >1,000

Mission: to conserve the Earth's living natural heritage, our global biodiversity, and to demonstrate that human societies are able to live harmoniously with nature

CI’s Field Programs

Center for Applied Biodiversity Science

Established in 1999 with a dual mandate to:

a) Supporting science in CI’s field programs

b) Facilitate stronger interaction between science and conservation generally

Mission: to strengthen our ability to respond rapidly, wisely and effectively to emerging threats to the Earth's biological diversity

Why map (surrogates of) biodiversity?

a) Identifying and filling survey gaps

b) Biogeography and macroecology

c) Assessing representation and prioritization for conservation

Mapping museum specimens

• Points showing “area of occupancy”

• Undoubtedly the best biodiversity data: can always be degraded to coarser resolution, but not vice versa

• …but, expensive and time-consuming to collect and compile, causing errors of omission (false absences)

Identifying survey gaps: museums

• Reptiles of Sub-Saharan Africa (Biodiversity Foundation for Africa/Natural History Museum of Zimbabwe – Bulawayo)

• Reptiles of Melanesia and the Pacific (Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum – Honolulu)

• Birds of Colombia (Natural History Museum – London; Instituto de Ciencias Naturales & Instituto Alexander von Humboldt – Bogotá)

• Bats of PNG (Papua New Guinea National Museum and Art Gallery – Port Moresby)

• Plus: Threatened Birds of Asia (BirdLife International – Cambridge): see http://www.rdb.or.id

The distribution of Great Indian Bustard Ardeotis nigriceps

From: Collar et al. (2001) Threatened Birds of Asia: the BirdLife International Red Data Book. BirdLife International, Cambridge, UK

TERRESTRIAL RAP

AQUARAP

MARINE RAP

Filling survey gaps: RAP

Inductive range modelling

• Overlay habitat maps to determine environmental envelope

• Extrapolate to surrounding areas within the envelope

• Errors of commission (false presences) beyond the extent of occurrence

(due to role of history)

Why map (surrogates of) biodiversity?

a) Identifying and filling survey gaps

b) Biogeography and macroecology

c) Assessing representation and prioritization for conservation

Mapping species’ ranges

• Polygons of “extent of occurrence”

• Largely restricted to birds and large mammals

• Easy to interpret, e.g., for field guides

• Errors of commission within the extent of occurrence

Computerizing species’ ranges

• Birds and mammals of the Americas (CABS-CI, ABI-TNC, WWF-US)

• Mammals of Asia (Univ. of Virginia)

• Birds and mammals of Melanesia (CABS-CI)

• Birds, mammals and amphibians of Africa (ZMUC, Univ. of Cambridge, Natural History Museum – London, CABS-CI)

Species richness in all African mammals, birds, snakes, and amphibians, mapped on a 1-degree grid

From: Brooks et al. (in press) BioScience

Deductive range modelling

• Assign habitat preferences to each species

• Identify these suitable habitats on habitat map

• Cut suitable habitats by species’ extent of occurrence

Modelled distribution of South African Crested Porcupine Hystrix africaeaustralis

From: Boitani et al. (1999) A Databank for the Conservation and Management of the African Mammals. Instituto Ecologia Applicata, Rome, Italy

Why map (surrogates of) biodiversity?

a) Identifying and filling survey gaps

b) Biogeography and macroecology

c) Assessing representation and prioritization for conservation

Representation exercises

• Ecoregions (Olson & Dinerstein 1998)

• Include aquatic and marine

• Terrestrial vertebrates now listed by ecoregion

• Prioritization (“Global 200”)

Ecoregions of the Philippines

From: Wikramanayake et al. (in press) Terrestrial Ecoregions of the Indo-Pacific: a Conservation Assessment. Island Press, Washington, D.C., USA

“Hotspots” of biodiversity

• Conservation prioritization

• Ecoregions w/ high endemism and threat

• >1,500 (0.5% global) plant endemism

• Endemism estimated, not listed• Myers (1988, 1990), Mittermeier et al. (1998, 1999), Myers et al. (2000)

HotspotsFrom: Myers et al. (2000) Nature 403: 853-858)

Current “hotspots” efforts

• “Major Tropical Wilderness Areas”: high endemism but low threat

• 10 more “hotspots”: 1,000 + endemics

• Natural break in plant endemism appears to fall at 500-1,000 endemics

• Dynamism considering threat

Current “hotspots” efforts

Pine-oak woodlands

Middle Asian mountains

Queensland wet tropics

Melanesia

Taiwan

South-east China mountains

Horn of Africa

Ethiopian highlandsAlbertine Rift

Maputaland-Pondoland

Other global prioritization exercises

• “Endemic Bird Areas”: ecoregions with 2 + bird species with ranges of <50,000 sq. km (Stattersfield et al. 1998)

• “Centers of Plant Diversity”: ecoregions and sites thought to be priorities for plant conservation (IUCN & WWF 1994, 1995, 1997)

Conservation Priority-Setting Workshops:

increasing spatial resolution

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CONAKRY

ACCRA

MONROVIA

FREETOWN

ABIDJAN

Corridorplanning:linking protected areas with “biodiversity-friendly” land use

Other regional prioritization exercises

• “Important Bird Areas”: sites holding threatened, restricted-range or biome endemic species, or unusual concentrations (BirdLife International)

• “Ecoregion-Based Conservation”: through specialist workshops (WWF)

Outstanding problems

• Data still incomplete at all levels

• Free, public, global access to data: the internet provides the mechanism

• Referencing and dating every “species-in-mapping-unit” record

• System for continuous data updates: quality vs quantity