Implementing Ecosystem Management

An Ecosystem Management Process

Step 1. Select an ecologically meaningful unit (e.g. an ecoregion, a landscape, a watershed, etc.)

Step 2. Conduct an integrated assessment, consisting of:- An ecological assessment

a) Terrestrialb) Aquatic

- A Socio-economic assessment- An integrated analysis of the first two components

Step 3 Develop a range of management alternatives Determine the “Desired Future Condition”

Step 4. Select an alternative, then implement it.

Step 5. Monitor

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How do we construct a range of management alternatives?

1. “No Action” alternative – required by NEPA

2. A range of alternatives that varies by the extent or intensity of actions proposed

• Slight action

• Moderate action

• Extreme action

3. Alternatives that tradeoff multiple objectives in varying combinations

4. Alternatives proposed by interest groups or constituencies

Sewing Together a Functional Landscape:

What are the building blocks of a functional landscape?

There is a spectrum of management opportunities

Active Management:• Intensive landscape manipulation

• Conservation through an orchestrated shifting mosaic of patches over time

• Provides resource managers with maximum flexibility but carries high risk

Passive Management:• Conservation focused on fully protected “core” reserves

• Initial active restoration efforts often included

• But nature left “to take its course” thereafter

Intermediary Approaches• Combines elements of both

• Landscape zoned into a range of allocations

• Different allocations managed actively or passively or somewhere in between

IUCN’s* Six Protected Areas Management Categories

Category I. Strict Nature Reserve: managed for science or wilderness

Category II.National Park: managed primarily for ecosystem protection and recreation

Category III. Natural Monument: managed primarily for conservation of specific natural features

Category IV. Habitat/Species Management Area: managed for conservation through active intervention

Category V.Protected Landscape/Seascape: Managed for cultural and scenic integrity, conservation, and recreation; human

settlements and agricultural areas are accommodated

Category VI. Managed Resource Protected Area: Managed primarily for the sustainable use of ecosystems

IUCN = The World Conservation Union, previously known as the International Union for the Conservation of Nature

Large Core Reserve

Small Core Reserve

Protected Areas Explained1. What is a protected area?

• “An area of land and/or sea especially dedicated to the protection of biological diversity and natural and associated cultural resources, and managed through legal or other effective means (IUCN 1996).”

2. Benefits provided by protected areas– Conservation of ecosystems and biodiversity– Recreation– Prevention of erosion on watersheds– Provision of clean water to cities– Provision of clean air– Control of biological pests– Preservation of medicinal and genetic resources– Maintenance of harvestable resources– Soil regeneration– Nutrient cycling– Carbon sequestration/climatic regulation

Core Reserves

• SLOSS = single large or several small

• Minimum Critical Area: The minimum size needed to support viable populations of constituent species

• Minimum Dynamic Area: The minimum size needed to absorb large disturbances and still maintain colonization sources and viable populations

• Redundancy• Representativeness• Gap Analysis

National Gap Analysis Program

The mission of the Gap Analysis Program (GAP) is to provide regional assessments of the conservation status of native vertebrate species and natural land cover types and to facilitate the application of this information to land management activities. This is accomplished through the following five objectives:

1. map the land cover of the United States

2. map predicted distributions of vertebrate species for the U.S.

3. document the representation of vertebrate species and land cover types in areas managed for the long-term maintenance of

biodiversity

4. provide this information to the public and those entities charged with land use research, policy, planning, and management

5. build institutional cooperation in the application of this information to state and regional management activities.

Status of the Gap Analysis Program

Vegetation/landcover: picture is Lake Champlain lowlands from VT Gap Project

Overlaid on

Vertebrate species distributions: picture is bat diversity in Washington state from WA Gap Project

Overlaid on maps of protected areas

Result: Biologically important areas left out of protected areas system are recommended for future protection

Marine Protected Areas of the World

Hawaiian Islands National Marine Monument:• Largest marine reserve in the world

• 140,000 sq. miles

Protected Areas for Individual Commercial Fish Species

Protected Areas as Population “Sources” for entire commercial fisheries

Nodes and MUMs (Noss and Harris 1986)

Buffer

Buffer

Buffers• Standards and guidelines prescribe management actions and policies that maintain habitat

features and connectivity around core. • Human uses are accommodated if they don’t compromise the primary objective of the core.

• Can include several layers or concentric circles of buffering, with decreasing levels of protection moving away from the core

• Buffers often exist on paper but mean little in reality due to lack enforcement or conflicts with local communities, land tenure, etc.

Examples• UNESCO’s Man and the Biosphere Programme Biosphere reserves

– Yellowstone, Olympic National Park, Smokey Mountains National Park Is it working?

• Integrated Conservation and Development Programs (ICDP) internationally sponsored projects, including indigenous extractive reserves, in developing nations

MAB Biosphere Reserves in the United States

Terrestrial

Corridor

Terrestrial Corridors• Pros

– Species for which the corridors provide effective dispersal habitat can use them

– Helps maintain demographic (and thus genetic) interaction between populations

– Provide landscape features with other, indirect benefits, such as wind breaking, run-off reduction, soil stabilization, etc.

• Cons– May be a “sink” for a subset of species

– May expose dispersing individuals to predation

– Animals may not find or use them

– Hard to establish wide enough (and long enough) corridors in populated landscapes

Source: Bo Wilmer

Riparian Corridor

Riparian CorridorsPros• “dendritic” networks form an extensive system of potential

corridors• Many species prefer to move along riparian corridors• Links together aquatic ecosystems• Corridors act as riparian buffers, so they provide other ecological

functions, such as bank stabilization, in-stream shade, habitat for riparian dependent species, etc.

Cons• Some terrestrial species won’t use them.• They don’t entirely link together headwater areas or provide

lateral linkages in lowland areas they don’t always connect the core area you need connected!

Connectivity: Have to think about aquatic ecosystem connectivity too!

Non-corridor Connectivity Approaches• Provide a variety of habitats structures across the landscape and in intervening areas

between core reserves.

• These might include:- Smaller patches and blocks of habitat- A mosaic of patches that provides the mix of habitat types needed to support

dispersing animals- Forest stands managed to “dispersal habitat” standards- Individual structures, such as snags and scattered larger trees.- Long-rotation forestry; gradient-of-retention forestry- Protection for special habitats, such as caves, talus slopes, other rocky out-

croppings, wetlands, seeps, etc.

• Example: the Northwest Forest Plan – used a combination of riparian buffers and structural retention in managed areas to provide connectivity, but decided not to use discrete terrestrial corridors

Late-Successional Reserves Designated by the Northwest Forest Plan

From: Vogt, K.A., J.C. Gordon, J.P. Wargo, D.J. Vogt, H. Asbjornsen, P.A. Palmiotto, H. J. Clark, J.L. O’Hara, W.S. Keeton, T. Patel-Weynand, and E. Witten. 1997. Ecosystems: Balancing Science with Management. Springer-Verlag.

“Demonstration of Ecosystem Management Options”

15 trees per acre:

How effective is this ecologically?

Wetland Restoration

Terrestrial Restoration

Riparian Restoration

Restoration AreasRestoration is the return of a degraded ecosystem to a close approximation of its remaining natural potential.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agencies’ principles of good restoration:• Preserve and protect aquatic resources• Restore ecological integrity• Restore natural structure• Restore natural function• Work within the watershed and broader landscape context• Understand the natural potential of the watershed• Address ongoing causes of degradation• Develop clear, achievable, and measurable goals• Focus on feasibility• Use a reference site• Anticipate future changes• Involve the skills and insights of a multi-disciplinary team• Design for self-sustainability• Use passive restoration, when appropriate• Restore native species and avoid non-native species• Use natural fixes and bioengineering techniques, where possible• Monitor and adapt where changes are necessary

Matrix

Matrix

Matrix• Matrix provides the primary area for intensive resource use, including

extractive uses and more intensive recreational development.

• Matrix is very important ecologically. Why?– It is the dominant patch type – covers the largest area– So probably includes much, if the not majority, of the biodiversity– Determines the level of connectivity– Strongly influences the effectiveness of reserves– Produces ecosystem goods and services for people

• “Standards and guidelines” on public lands, or other incentives or collaborative-based approaches on private lands, help maintain some level of habitat protection and ecosystem functioning.

• Site-suitability standards that prescribe the site-specific appropriateness of management activities.

MatrixLarge Core Reserve

Buffer Terrestrial

Corridor

Terrestrial RestorationWetland Restoration

Riparian Restoration

Riparian Corridor

Matrix

Matrix Large Core Reserve

Buffer

Small Core Reserve

Intensively modified areas/urban/low potential

Where will the functional landscape approach work?

• The functional landscape approach will involve a range of strategies depending on context.

• Can fully implement on large-ownerships, such as in the western U.S., portions of the northern forest bioregion, southern Appalachian region, etc.

• Need other approaches in private and small ownership dominated landscapes

Strategies for private land dominated landscapes

• Tax incentives• Property tax reform• Conservation easements• Information sharing• Watershed

groups/coordination• Community-based forestry

and tourism• Wildland, wetland, or forest

mitigation banks

• Fostering “sense of place”

• Green certification

• Planning and land-use zoning

• Subsidies: some like them, some don’t

• Public lands acquisition

• Regulation through environmental statutes

Tax-Based Approaches• Tax incentives• Property tax reform

Easements• Conservation

easements

• Transfer of development rights

Information Sharing

• Information transfer• Community/watershed groups

White River Partnership:

• Local governments/towns

• State agencies

• Federal agencies

• Conservation groups

Conservation “Banks”

• Wildlands, wetlands, and forests

http://nature.org/aboutus/projects/forestbank/

Fostering Sense of Place

Regulation, Subsidies, or Acquisition?

• Land and Water Conservation Fund, est. 1965

-Authorized to spend $900 million annually

- Only met twice in 42 years

-FY 2007: Enacted Allocation: $143,000,000

- to Forest Service, Park Service, BLM, Fish and Wildlife Service, and State grants