Recipient Organization
UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON
4333 BROOKLYN AVE NE
SEATTLE,WA 98195
Performing Department
Wildlife Science
Non Technical Summary
We propose to provide planning tools that facilitate cross-jurisdictional management to maximize support of shrub-steppe habitat resilience and human community resilience in Douglas County, Washington in the face of climate change.We will create a geodatabase useful for implementation of resilience strategies, including information on current and projected future distribution of critical habitat for wildlife connectivity, forage, dryland wheat, and cheatgrass.We will recommend management strategies to optimize social and environmental goals.
Animal Health Component
100%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
(N/A)
Applied
100%
Developmental
(N/A)
Goals / Objectives
The principal purpose of this project is to provide management options for shrub-steppe habitats in Douglas County, WA that benefit both public wildlife values and rural lifestyles and livelihoods.The University of Washington hopes to synthesize and interpret the best available science on changes in ecological resilience to climate change, to anticipate potential changes in human communities, and to suggest management direction to maintain or improve ecological and sociological resiliencies.
Project Methods
We will synthesize and interpret the best available science on changes in ecological resilience to climate change to anticipate potential changes in human communities.We will suggest management direction to maintain or improve ecological and grazing/agricultural resiliencies.The focal area of this proposal is Douglas County, Washington, the Arid Lands Initiative Proof-of-Concept Area (POC). We will assemble available data layers for Douglas County, working with the Arid Lands Initiative to identify data sources. Ecological importance, wildlife habitat, and wildlife connectivity zones: Areas of ecological importance for several focal species, and areas important for wildlife connectivity, have been gathered by the Washington Wildlife Habitat Connectivity Working Group (WWHCWG)'s Columbia Plateau sub-group.The WWHCWG also has assembled layers for Ecological Integrity. Climate projections: Climate change projections, projected changes in biomes, and projected shifts in the distributions of individual species (e.g., sagebrush spp., sage grouse) produced for a concurrent Climate Vulnerability Assessment project conducted by the Landscape Ecology and Conservation Lab at the University of Washington will help to inform expected changes in the sagebrush steppe in Douglas County.Prevalence of cheatgrass under future climate scenarios will be assessed based on Bradley (2010). Human disturbance footprint: We will consider NatureServe's Landscape Condition or Theobald's Human Modification' layer.However, the WWHCWG's Ecological Integrity layer (WWHCWG 2010) is a more detailed assessment for the study area and may be used instead of human disturbance. We will synthesize these data and identify areas that may best continue to support grazing under climate change while avoiding areas of key ecological importance.We will use an approach such as simulated annealing (i.e. program Marxan). 1.1 Synthesize available science to identify and map the following, data permitting: Functional shrub-steppe habitat Cheatgrass Wildlife connectivity corridors, climate refugia, or disturbance refugia Animal Unit Months & land area in grazing Dryland wheat (or other) agriculture acreage Human disturbance footprint Areas with high fuels & fire importance. 1.2 Map projected changes due to climate change by ~2070 where data are available. Output could include spatial patterns or direction of changes. 1.3 Suggest management responses based on results, with the following goals: Maintain current levels of grazing/agriculture; Increase or maximize ecological resiliency; Favor mechanisms that are feasible/ achievable considering current ownership and management restrictions (for example, cooperative grazing or incentives to offset maintenance of ecological resilience). The final reportwill summarize the above information about potential climate change impacts to grazing and ecological resilience in Douglas County.The report will also detail management responses based on these results.The report will include maps of data layers included in the geodatabase as well as maps of alternative prioritizations.