ESM 270: Conservation Planning theory and practice

Monday and Wednesday 2:30-3:45, Bren Hall room 1510

Instructors

Leah Gerber, Associate Professor, Arizona State University

Ben Best

PhD Student, Duke University

Office Hours

Leah: Friday 12:00-2:00 or by appointment

Ben: Tuesday 2:00-4:00 in GIS Lab or by appointment

Text (optional)

Margules, C. and S. Sahotra. 2007. Systematic Conservation Planning. Cambridge University Press.

Course Goals

Analytical approaches can be used to direct energy and resources toward conservation that yields the greatest return on investment. This class includes case studies of how government agencies, international multilateral institution and non-governmental agencies identify where to invest their conservation efforts.

Classes will be comprised of lectures, discussions and computer laboratories.Using real-world examples, students will learn about conservation planning tools that are used to support management and policy decisions. We will explore the theory of conservation planning tools and evaluation, with a focus on how to apply and interpret models. The class will provide students with technical, written and oral communication skills.

Overview of lecture-lab schedule

Lectures/discussions (Mondays) are intended to provide you with a background in the theory that is relevant to conservation planning, whereas labs (Wednesdays) will introduce you to a few tools of the trade for implementing commonly used tools in conservation planning.


Directed Research Project

The purpose of the group project is to apply the concepts and methods from seminar readings and discussions to conduct a regional conservation analysis. You will work in teams of 3-4 students. Each team will prepare a written report and an oral presentation, due in Week 10, summarizing the results of their analysis. We will provide the data layers that were used in the Gulf of California Ecoregional Assessment (ERA), and will teach you the tools of the trade in conducting such analyses. With these tools, topics for directed research projects are flexible. For example, you may focus on including connectivity in the ERA, developing a monitoring and implementation plan, or including climate change in the analysis. We anticipate that your results will be useful to both conservation practitioners in the Gulf of California (e.g., TNC) and also have potential for publication. In fact, you should format your paper to be submitted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal. Sections should include an introduction, methods, results, and discussion. Check the “instructions to authors” for the journal Conservation Biology at http://conbio.net/scb/Publications/ConsBio/, and note specific format for citations! The maximum length for the paper is 15 pages, not including references and figures. You will have a chance to get feedback when you submit your proposal. The proposal should make clear who will be doing what for the final paper. We encourage you to take this assignment seriously and consider working on a paper that you will actually submit to for publication.

Assessment and Grading

15%: Lab assignments

45%: Directed Research Project

10%: Directed Research Project Proposal

15%: Directed Research Project Final Oral Presentation

15%: Participation AND attendance

2011 Class Schedule (SUBJECT TO CHANGE)

Day / Date / Topic / PLAN / READINGS and Discussion Leader
Mon / 1/3 / Lecture: Conservation Elements / Measures of biodiversity for setting conservation priorities: species (indicators, umbrellas, flagships and keystones), communities and landscapes / Ahern 2005, Forman 1997, Noss 1990, Simberloff 1998
Wed / 1/5 / Discussion: Multicriteria scoring, hotspot analysis / Global hotspots, local area ranking, multi-criterion scoring methods, habitat suitability modeling / Kareiva 2007 (Shepard),
Myers 2000 (Dashiell),
Regan 2007 (Sanneman),
Theobald 2002 (Hoagland)
Mon / 1/10 / Lab: Intro to GIS / ArcGIS intro: browsing catalog, making maps, building models
Wed / 1/12 / Lab: Species Distribution Modeling
*meet in SCF lab / From observational points to surfaces via environment. Modeling techniques: GLM, GAM, Maxent, BRT / Elith 2009, Underwood 2010
Mon / 1/17 / No class – MLK holiday
Wed / 1/19 / Lecture: Conservation planning in the Gulf of CA
(Anne Gondor, TNC) / Gulf of CA ecoregional assessment, science and implementation
*Lab 1 due
Friday / 1/21 / Discussion: Systematic conservation planning / Gap analysis, systematic conservation planning, portfolio design, set selection methods
*Discuss project ideas, form groups for case study / Possingham 2000 (Battista)
Jennings 2000 (Betz)
Noss 1990 (Callahan)
Simberloff 1998 (Labrum)
Margules 2000 (Silvester)
Mon / 1/24 / Lab: Systematic conservation planning with Marxan / *Lab 2 due
Weds / 1/26 / Discussion: Viable populations / Population viability analysis, habitat conservation planning and recovery planning under the Endangered Species Act, planning for wide-ranging species
*Proposals due Friday 1/28 / Groves 2002 (Campbell)
Kautz 2001 (Tresham)
Moilanen 2005 (Umezawa)
Sanderson 2002 (Schinn)
Sarkar et al. 2006 (Reynolds)
Mon / 1/31 / Lab: Marxan with Zones / Evaluating level of protection and consequences, ecosystem services
Weds / 2/2 / Lecture: Ecosystem services (Laura Dee) / Conservation planning to provide food production, carbon sequestration, water quality, flood control, and other ecosystem services / Barbier 2007, Barbier et al. 2008, Turner & Daily 2008, Daily 1997
Mon
(lec) / 2/7 / Threats assessment (Ben Halpern) / Cumulative impacts assessment; developing indicators of ocean health / Crain et al. 2008
Butchart et al. 2010
Halpern 2008
Weds
(lec) / 2/9 / Lab and Discussion: Conservation planning in a Dynamic World/ Conservation planning in marine ecosystems
Short lecture: Key principles recap. / Urban growth, human footprint, climate change/
Hydrological planning units, coastal influences, dynamic oceanography, planning in the real world / Ackerly 2010 (Riley)
Hoegh-Guldberg 2008 (Taylor)
Lee 2008 (VanAbel)
Williams 2005 (Clark)
Pressey 2007 (Blazek)
Armsworth 2006 (Price)
Game 2009 (Villareal)
Oliviera 2007 (Jacobson)
Mon (lab) / 2/14 / Lab: Marxan lab review and group project assistance / *Lab 3 due
Weds
(lec) / 2/16 / Lecture: The real world of conservation planning (Satie Airame) / Policy, process and management issues with the Marine Life Protection Act
Mon / 2/21 / No class – Presidents day
Wed
(lec) / 2/23 / Lecture: Climate change and conservation planning (Lee Hannah) / Climate change, biodiversity conservation *draft papers due / Hannah 2007
Mon
(lab) / 2/28 / Lab: Connectivity / Circuitscape / group project assistance
*peer review reports / McRae 2008
Wed
(lec) / 3/2 / Short lecture: Key principles recap
Class project presentations
Mon
(lec) / 3/7 / Class project presentations
Wed
(lec) / 3/9 / Class project presentations / *final papers due

*Readings are posted on GauchoSpace