Degradation of water quality is important to the residents and visitors of Tillamook Bay because it has been linked to loss of income due to oyster bed closures, declines in salmonid populations and can result in a decrease of recreational use of the estuary’s resources. Both point and non-point sources of pollution have been targeted for investigation by the Tillamook Bay National Estuary Project (TBNEP), a project designed to bring local stakeholders and citizens together with State and Federal regulators and scientists.
The Sierra Nevada has been an integral part of the heritage of California and has played a profound role in the history of the nation. However, the extensive and varied resource values of the Sierra Nevada, so essential to the lives and well-being of the citizens of the state, are increasingly threatened by conflicting land management objectives resulting from the checkerboard ownership pattern, expanding residential development, and threat of catastrophic fires that are a product of the private-public land ownership patterns in the north-central Sierra. In recognition of threats to the rich legacy of the Sierra Nevada, The Trust for Public Land (TPL) is implementing a conservation vision for this landscape—the Sierra Checkerboard Initiative— to produce a more sustainable landscape in the north-central Sierra. TPL and its partners—the Sierra Forest Legacy (formerly Sierra Nevada Forest Protection Campaign) and the Truckee Donner Land Trust—share a set of common goals and wish to address resource and development issues at a scale not previously undertaken in the region. These issues include watershed protection, wildlife and wilderness values, recreation and open space, adaptation to climate change, sequestration of greenhouse gases, sustainable timber harvest, and appropriate development.
This report summarizes available scientific information establishing the crucial role that Southern Orange County could play in efforts to conserve biodiversity at both global and regional scales. The report outlines a conservation framework for the area, using principles of conservation planning to delineate four core biological resource units. These four resource units must be conserved essentially intact, without further internal fragmentation by development, to continue supporting key species and ecosystem processes. We present this information in support of the Natural Community Conservation Planning (NCCP) program for the Sotuhern Oregon County NCCP subregion.
Over the past few decades, population growth has mushroomed in Orange County, as in the rest of Southern California, with the development of new communities and the infrastructure to support them. This growth has come at the expense of natural habitats and species in an area recognized as part of a global hotspot of biodiversity. The loss of habitat to development created a growing list of threatened and endangered species in Southern California, presenting challenges to federal, state, and local agencies responsible for natural resource protection, as well as to developers and land use planners trying to maintain a healthy economy. To respond to this dilemma, in 1991 the California legislature passed the Natural Community Conservation Planning (NCCP) Act to encourage a collaborative process for regional planning. As a result of the NCCP, natural open space reserves have been set aside in the coastal and central portions of Orange County which, when combined with National Forest lands, total approximately 163,000 acres of conserved habitat—majestic peaks, chaparral and oak-studded canyons, rolling scrub- and grassland covered hills, and the remnants of formerly extensive coastal lagoons and estuaries—lands that not only contribute to the preservation of biodiversity, but to the quality of life enjoyed by all Southern Californians. The legacy of this regional planning process continues, with the goal of protecting a green network of natural lands for wildlife habitat and open space recreation across jurisdictional boundaries in Southern California.
This report combines the results of two tasks funded under a local assistance grant from the California Department of Fish and Game (CDFG) for Multiple Species Conservation Program (MSCP) wildlife corridor monitoring: (1) the second consecutive year of monitoring for locations in the cities of Poway and San Diego, surveyed by San Diego State University (SDSU) graduate students (contract Task D) and (2) the first year of monitoring for new transect locations established by the Conservation Biology Institute (CBI) and San Diego Tracking Team (SDTT) (contract Task A). CBI directed both studies. Transects at some of the Poway-San Diego monitoring stations established in 2000 (CBI 2002b) were not re-surveyed, while monitoring protocols were altered slightly based on recommendations from CBI (2002b). Specifically, in addition to the data collected at baited track stations, the presence or absence of wildlife, as evidenced by all types of sign, was recorded along the entire length of the transect to compare the methods. These sign surveys along the track station transects are thus similar to surveys conducted by the SDTT.
There is increasing interest in the effects of urbanization on natural systems. Among the variety of observed effects, urbanization has long been recognized as affecting hydrological characteristics of streams and rivers. Given the close coupling of stream hydrologic characteristics and riparian plant species ecology, we examined the effects of watershed urbanization on riparian vegetation communities via alterations in the hydrologic regime of a coastal southern California riparian system. These coastal river systems in southern California have received little attention in the literature.
It has been commonly reported that gray wolves (Canis lupus) as well as other predators like panthers (Felis concolor) and lynx (Lynx canadensis) once lived throughout the northeastern U.S. including what is today the Adirondack Park. Extirpation of these summit predators closely followed European settlement (see Schneider 1997). As a result of an active bounty system, the last wolf was believed to have been killed in Upstate New York during the mid 1890s.
In recent years, gray wolf recovery (both natural and human-directed) has been successful in a number of locations throughout North America — most successfully in the Upper Great Lakes region of the U.S. (see Fuller 1995). A second population of gray wolves in the eastern U.S. outside the Minnesota population has been expressed as a goal for gray wolf recovery in the U.S. by federal agencies (see U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service 1992), and the Northeast has been identified as a potential region to support a viable population of wolves. In addition to northern sections of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, the AP has been identified as potentially supportive of gray wolves (see Mladenoff and Sickley 1998).
This study was by the Adirondack Park Citizens Action Committee organized by Defenders of Wildlife to examine the issue of gray wolf recovery in the Adirondack Park (from now on referred to as simply AP). By combining what has been learned about wolf biology from numerous field studies with geographic information systems (GIS), we addressed the issue of gray wolf reintroduction feasibility in the AP. In addition to developing wolf habitat suitability and connectivity models, we examined the important genetics questions pertinent to wolves in the AP.
The mission of the Volcan Mountain Preserve Foundation (VMPF) is conservation and stewardship of the majestic 15-mile long Volcan Mountains complex, situated within the Peninsular Ranges of Southern California (Figure 1). The emphasis of VMPF is conserving natural habitats and the species they support, maintaining wilderness values and connections to adjacent open space, preserving archaeological sites, and encouraging natural history-based research and education.
Land conservation in the Volcan Mountains began in 1989; since that time, over 9,000 acres of the former Rutherford Ranch on Volcan Mountain have been acquired by public agencies and non-governmental organizations as protected open space, complemented by conservation of tens of thousands of acres of surrounding lands (Figure 2). However, approximately 1,800 acres of Rutherford Ranch in the heart of the range, between these conserved lands and the Santa Ysabel Indian Reservation on the western flank of the mountain, lie unprotected and are currently threatened with development of estate lots.
VMPF requested that The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and Conservation Biology Institute (CBI) prepare a brief case statement that would provide the basis from which it can develop a focused conservation strategic plan. This case statement describes the landscape that is the inspiration for the VMPF, with a focus on the privately held portions of Rutherford Ranch, by identifying regional conservation values and potential partners for conservation of these values within the context of existing opportunities.
The Sierra Nevada, John Muir’s Range of Light, is a state and national treasure, valued for its scenic beauty, rich biodiversity, ancient forests, unparalleled recreational opportunities, and commercial timber and water resources. The Sierra Nevada supports over 60% of California’s vertebrate species and over half of its plant species. For its size, it is the most floristically diverse area in North America. The Sierra supports 50 million recreational visitor days each year, and its watersheds deliver 65% of the water supply for California residents.
National interest in roadless area conservation dates back to the 1970s when the Forest Service was directed by Congress to inventory roadless areas in response to the public’s growing desire to protect wild landscapes primarily through wilderness designations. In 2001, President Clinton enacted the Roadless Conservation Rule to protect 58.5 million acres of inventoried roadless areas on Forest Service lands, including nearly 2 million acres in Oregon. However, on May 13, 2005 the Bush administration issued a revised rule that established a process for governors to propose locally supported regulations for conserving roadless area within their states. While some states, including Oregon, have legally challenged this rule change, State governments will continue to play a vital role in providing recommendations to the Forest Service concerning the protection of federal roadless areas. This report provides new information on the importance of roadless areas in Oregon that places these areas among the most ecologically valued in the nation, thereby providing a scientific foundation for protecting all of Oregon’s roadless lands regardless of the method to achieve this outcome.