Spatial Prioritization of Conifer Management Deciles Reinhardt et al 2024 [United States]
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Open Data · 2024 Full Details
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Full Details
- Title
- Spatial Prioritization of Conifer Management Deciles Reinhardt et al 2024 [United States]
- Description
- Abstract File-based data for download: https://www.sciencebase.gov/catalog/item/68926f30d4be0275ee63fd19 Sagebrush ecosystems across the western U.S. are in decline due to numerous threats, including expansion of coniferous woodlands and forests. The interagency Sagebrush Conservation Design effort recently quantified sagebrush ecological integrity (SEI) to map remaining core sagebrush areas (relatively intact and functional sagebrush ecosystems) and understand spatial and temporal patterns of change relative to primary threats. This work identified conifer expansion as the second leading cause of decline in sagebrush ecological integrity biome wide. Here, we sought to create a spatial prioritization of conifer management that maximizes return-on-investment to defend and grow core sagebrush areas. Multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) was used to incorporate a series of biome-level inputs including SEI, invasive annual grass cover and risk, structural connectivity, and conifer cover and expansion vulnerability into a single prioritization based on collaborative expert input. Our analysis identifies priority areas for conifer management across the sagebrush biome, simulates conifer treatments based on those priorities, and estimates potential changes in SEI as a result of targeted treatment. At a broad scale, we found that the highest priority areas for conifer management were largely located east of the Rocky Mountains. This represents a departure from recent landscape-level trends conifer management efforts in sagebrush systems, which were focused primarily pinyon-juniper expansion in the Great Basin. A majority (52%) of the highest priority areas are managed by the Bureau of Land Management, 38 followed by a large proportion (26%) of priority areas located on privately-owned land - particularly in Wyoming and Montana. Targeting simulated conifer treatments using our prioritization resulted in higher within-core targeting percentages (≥93%) than business-as-usual efforts (23.8%), which would result in a four- to eight-fold reduction in the time to treat priority areas within cores. Finally, we demonstrate that these simulated treatments, targeted with our prioritization, have the capacity to improve SEI in and around treatment areas. This work provides an actionable path to "Defend the Core" as outlined by the Sagebrush Conservation Design effort by helping conservationists more efficiently address conifer expansion in and around core sagebrush areas.
- Creator
- U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
- Publisher
- U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Open Data
- Temporal Coverage
- 2024
- Date Issued
- 2025-08-05
- Rights
- United States Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) shall not be held liable for improper or incorrect use of the data described and/or contained herein. While the Service makes every reasonable effort to ensure the accuracy and completeness of data provided for distribution, it may not have the necessary accuracy or completeness required for every possible intended use. The Service recommends that data users consult the associated metadata record to understand the quality and possible limitations of the data. The Service creates metadata records in accordance with the standards endorsed by the Federal Geographic Data Committee. As a result of the above considerations, the Service gives no warranty, expressed or implied, as to the accuracy, reliability, or completeness of the data. It is the responsibility of the data user to use the data in a manner consistent with the limitations of geospatial data in general and these data in particular. Although these data have been processed successfully on a computer system at the Service, no warranty, expressed or implied, is made regarding the utility of the data on another system or for general or scientific purposes, nor shall the act of distribution constitute any such warranty. This applies to the use of the data both alone and in aggregate with other data and information.
- Access Rights
- Public
- Format
- ArcGIS ImageMapLayer
- Language
- English
- Date Added
- August 25, 2025
- Provenance Statement
- The metadata for this resource was last retrieved from U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Open Data on 2026-01-08.
Cite and Reference
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Citation
U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (2025). Spatial Prioritization of Conifer Management Deciles Reinhardt et al 2024 [United States]. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Open Data. https://gis-fws.opendata.arcgis.com/content/fws::spatial-prioritization-of-conifer-management-deciles-reinhardt-et-al-2024 (web service) -
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