Mapping Wildlife Landscapes
Using state-of-the-art computational methods and satellite imagery, the Act Green coalition has led the creation and implementation of a flexible modelling framework that can monitor the available habitat for large-bodied, wide-ranging species at a range-wide, continental scale in near real time. The framework accounts for land use and land cover, current human pressures, habitat connectivity, and species needs. Additionally, the framework can use trends in human pressures on the landscape to project future habitat availability. Moving beyond traditional range maps, Act Green delineates three types of landscapes: species conservation landscapes, which are intact blocks of contiguous habitat containing functional populations; restoration landscapes, which are areas of suitable habitat from which the species has disappeared; and survey landscapes, where the status of the species is uncertain. The maps also show fragments, which are areas that are too small to qualify as landscapes but which still contain suitable habitat, and may still contain remnant populations of a species.
The results, as well as all input data other than the species observations themselves, are freely available, as is the code used to generate them. The sources of species observation data are given on the data access page and may be requested from individual authors.
