Computers, Society, and Nature

Thanks to a student in the Intro GIS course.

Landscape ecology is a field that focuses on understanding processes at the landscape level. Due to the inherent spatiality of this field, GIS is especially well placed to make a contribution in terms of predictive research and thus enhance conservation management and policy-making. The Point Reyes Bird Observatory (PRBO), makes extensive use of GIS. Founded in 1965, PRBO has accomplished many feats in terms of bird ecology research, using partnership with other private and public institutions. It has initiated a division whose goal is to integrate GIS into its research and into monitoring activities of birds and their habitats.

One interesting project launched by PRBO has been to predict how wetland birds in the South San Francisco Bay could be affected by changes in their habitat. Over time, the original salt marshes of the area had been converted to salt ponds. This has diminished habitat space for certain migrating fowl species. There has been a recent push to convert the space back to its original form. The PRBO is working to create a habitat conversion model to plan the optimal means of achieving this goal.

The GIS staff at PRBO combined data from bird surveys, aerial photos, statistical analyses and spatial modeling. They were able to discover useful knowledge concerning the possible effects habitat conversion would have on the wildlife. They quantified preferred variations in terms of size, location, as well as certain physical attributes of salt ponds, channels, and tidal marshes. Analysis of this information has allowed PRBO to create different restoration scenarios. As such, they have contributing to the management of the area.

GIS can thus be quite useful in terms of furthering knowledge of landscape ecology, and on all the impacts this field has on the management of different species worldwide.

[PRBO is also notable for its real-time implementation of GIS during a fire at the park. It’s a great story of what GIS can do in crisis situations as well as the strong support by GIS vendors of conservation efforts. To give you a sense of the short-time horizons of the project, plotters were air-lifted into the newly formed PRBO GIS office while the fire was raging.–Sieber]

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 3rd, 2005 at 12:17 am and is filed under geographic information systems. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.