Grasslands & Savannas (Southeast Blueprint Indicator) [U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service]
{'name': 'Department of the Interior'} Full Details
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- Title
- Grasslands & Savannas (Southeast Blueprint Indicator) [U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service]
- Description
- Reason for Selection Native grasslands and savannas are important for many endemic species, provide critical habitat and food for pollinators, and are often hotspots for biodiversity. Once a predominant ecosystem type, grasslands and savannas have significantly declined from their historical extent. In part because of the regular disturbance (e.g., mowing, fire) typically required to maintain high-quality grasslands, they are difficult to detect through remote sensing and are not well-captured by other indicators. In addition, grassland and savanna birds are experiencing significant declines and arecurrently off-track for meeting the SECAS 10% goal, so it is important that the Blueprint capture known and potential habitat. Input Data Texas Ecological Mapping Systems:statewide raster, accessed 12-2023 Oklahoma Ecological Systems Map:download the raster, accessed 12-2023 Protected Areas Database of the United States(PAD-US):PAD-US 3.0national geodatabase -Combined Proclamation Marine Fee Designation Easement;PAD-US 4.0national geodatabase-Combined Proclamation Marine Fee Designation Easement National Land Cover Database (NLCD): 2021 Land Cover, 2021 U.S. Forest Service (USFS) Tree Canopy Cover, 2013 Land Cover, and 2013 USFS Tree Canopy Cover 2020 LANDFIRE Biophysical Settings (BPS) [LF 2.2.0] Southeast Blueprint 2024 landscape condition indicator Southeast Blueprint 2024 extent Known grasslands Known grassland prairies dataset for the Middle Southeast subregion, provided by Toby Gray with Mississippi State University in Oct 2020 (available on request by emailingrua_mordecai@fws.gov); this is an improved version of the Known Prairie Patches in the Gulf Coastal Plains and Ozarks (GCPO)layer Known Piedmont prairie locations in the South Atlantic subregion: We identified known prairie locations by requesting spatial data on known prairies from the 74 members of the Piedmont Prairie Partnership mailing list and other prairie managers (Wake County Open Space program and Prairie Ridge Ecostation in NC). We combined that information with known locations in Virginia aggregated by the Virginia Natural Heritage Program (available on request by emailingrua_mordecai@fws.gov). Grassland polygons from the Catawba Indian Nation, provided by Aaron Baumgardner, Natural Resources Director, in July 2023 (for more informationemailrua_mordecai@fws.gov) Grassland polygons from two iNaturalist projects in Texas:erwin-park-prairie-restoration-area,stella-rowan-prairie Southeastern Grasslands Institute polygons from selected iNaturalist projects. We used only projects with polygons digitized at a fine resolution and did not include projects with more coarse polygons covering a large area. Specific projects used were: allegheny-mountains-riverscour-barrens, big-south-fork-riverscour-barrens-1, big-south-fork-riverscour-barrens-2, big-south-fork-riverscour-barrens-4-us, big-south-fork-riverscour-barrens-6, biodiversity-of-piedmont-granite-glades-outcrops, bluff-mountain-fen, caney-fork-sandstone-riverscour-barrens-and-glades, clear-creek-sandstone-riverscour-barrens, clear-fork-river-riverscour-barrens, craggy-mountains-mafic-outcrops-and-barrens, cumberland-plateau-escarpment-limestone-barrens, cumberland-river-limestone-riverscour-glades, daddy-s-creek-riverscour-barrens, dunbar-cave-prairie-restoration, eastern-highland-rim-limestone-riverscour-glade, emory-river-sandstone-riverscour-barrens, falls-of-the-ohio-river-limestone-riverscour-glade, flat-rock-cedar-glades-and-barrens-state-natural-area, grasshopper-hollow-fen, gunstocker-glade, hiwassee-river-phyllite-riverscour-glade, ketona-dolomite-barrens, laurel-river-riverscour-barrens-and-glades, lime-hills-limestone-barrens, limestone-barrens-of-the-western-valley-of-the-tennessee-river, little-mountains-limestone-barrens, little-river-canyon-riverscour-barrens-and-glades, moulton-valley-limestone-glades, mulberry-fork-of-black-warrior-river-riverscour-barrens-and-glades, muldraugh-s-hill-limestone-barrens, nashville- basin-limestone-glades, new-river-riverscour-barrens, obed-river-sandstone-riverscour-barrens, outer-bluegrass-dolomite-barrens, ridge-and-valley-sandstone-outcrops, rock-creek-sandstone-riverscour-barrens, rockcastle-river-sandstone-riverscour-barrens, shawnee-hills-sandstone-glades-and-outcrops, southern-blue-ridge-mountains-grass-balds, southern-blue-ridge-mountains-serpentine-barrens, southern-blue-ridge-phyllite-outcrops, southern-ridge-and-valley-limestone-glades, southern-ridge-and-valley-shale-barrens, southern-ridge-and-valley-siltstone-barrens, tennessee-ridge-and-valley-dolomite-barrens-and-woodlands-tn-us, the-farm-prairie-and-oak-savanna, tin-top-road-savanna, western-allegheny-escarpment-limestone-barrens, western-highland-rim-limestone-glade-and-barrens, western-valley-limestone-barrens-decatur-co-north-us, western-valley-limestone-barrens-hardin-wayne-cos, western-valley-limestone-barrens-perry-co, western-valley-silurian-limestone-barrens, white-s-creek-sandstone-riverscour-barrens-and-glades, folder-six-glades Mapping Steps Combine all known grasslands polygons and convert to raster, assigning them a value of 7. From the 2021 and 2013 NLCD landcover, create rasters that only include classes likely to have grasslands and savannas. The classes included are based on NLCD classes that overlap known grassland and savanna polygons. Any class that covered >1% of known grasslands and savannas is included: 31 Barren Land, 41 Deciduous Forest, 42 Evergreen Forest, 43 Mixed Forest, 52 Scrub/Shrub, 71 Grassland/Herbaceous, 81 Pasture/Hay. For those 2021 and 2013 selected landcover rasters, remove forest with ≥ 60% canopy cover using NLCD USFS Tree Canopy Cover for the corresponding year. This results in potential grassland and savanna rasters for 2021 and 2013. Make a single potential grassland and savanna raster that only includes pixels that are potential grasslands and savannas in both 2013 and 2021. This removes temporary grasslands and savannas that result from clearcuts. From the Texas and Oklahoma ecological systems maps, extract classes that predict areas invaded by mesquite, a non-native tree that spreads aggressively in the grasslands and savannas of the Southwest and disrupts natural ecosystems through its heavy water consumption. For Oklahoma, this is VegName = 'Ruderal Mesquite Shrubland'. For Texas, this is CommonName = 'Native Invasive: Mesquite Shrubland'. Combine these and use them to remove areas that are no longer grassland and savanna due to mesquite invasion. The resulting layer represents potential grasslands. To identify potential grasslands and savannas in natural landscapes, use values 5 and 6 from the landscape condition indicator. Assign a value of 3 to any potential grassland pixel that receives a landscape condition score of 5 or 6. Assign all other potential grassland pixels a value of 2. To identify likely grasslands and savannas, overlay the potential grasslands and savannas raster with select polygons from PAD-US 4.0. To pull out types of protected lands that commonly manage grasslands and savannas, we used GAP status, designation type, manager name, and easement holder. We also identified a number of protected areas directly by name that had important areas of grassland and savanna but weren't captured by the other rules. GAP status (GAP_sts) 1 or 2: Gap status 1 and 2 refer to areas managed for biodiversity that are not subject to extractive uses like logging and mining. GAP status 2 is technically intended to encompass areas where disturbance events are suppressed, but in practice, most protected areas in the Southeast that are actively managing grasslands and savannas are classified as GAP status 2. Designation type (Des_Tp) of ‘NWR', ‘MIL', ‘NF', or ‘NG' (i.e. National Wildlife Refuge, military installation, National Forest, or National Grassland) Manager name (Mang_Name) of ‘RWD' (i.e. Regional Water District) Local manager name (Loc_Mang) of 'Ducks Unlimited (Wetlands America Trust)' Easement holder (EsmtHldr) of 'Tall Timbers Research Station & Land Conservancy' Unit name (Unit_Nm) of ‘Point Washington State Forest', ‘Pine Log State Forest', ‘M. C. Davis - Seven Runs Creek Conservation Easement', ‘Nokuse Plantation Conservation Easements', ‘Tate's Hell State Forest', ‘Box-R Wildlife Management Area', ‘Aucilla Wildlife Management Area', ‘Snipe Island Unit', ‘Big Bend Wildlife Management Area', ‘Goethe State Forest', ‘Amelia Wildlife Management Area', ‘Powhatan Wildlife Management Area', ‘Cumberland State Forest', ‘Appomattox-Buckingham State Forest', ‘Haw River State Park', ‘R. Wayne Bailey - Caswell Game Land', ‘Medoc Mountain State Park', ‘Embro Game Land', ‘Dupont State Forest', ‘Hanging Rock State Park', ‘Bladen Lakes State Forest', ‘Whitehall Plantation Game Land', ‘Suggs Mill Pond Game Land', ‘Bushy Lake State Natural Area', ‘Pondberry Bay Plant Conservation Preserve', ‘Green Swamp Game Land', ‘Holly Shelter Game Land', ‘Chowan Swamp Game Land', ‘Brookgreen Gardens', ‘Cary State Forest', ‘Suwannee Ridge Mitigation Park Wildlife and Environmental Area', ‘Adams-Alapha Ag & Conservation Easement', ‘Twin Rivers State Forest', ‘Chattahoochee Fall Line Wildlife Management Area', ‘Enon Plantation', or ‘Georgia-Alabama Land Trust Easement #214', ‘Covington Wildlife Management Area', ' Magnolia Branch Wildlife Reserve', ‘Little River State Forest', or ‘Susan Turner Plantation', or have the local name (Loc_Nm) 'Sandhills Game Land', 'Blackwater River State Forest', 'Three Lakes Wildlife Management Area', 'Herky Huffman/Bull Creek Wildlife Management Area', 'Triple N Ranch Wildlife Management Area', 'Whaley Conservation Easement', 'Babcock Ranch Preserve', 'Withlacoochee State Forest', 'Lake Wales Ridge State Forest', 'EVERGLADES HEADWATERS NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE AND CONSERVATION AREA', 'Seminole State Forest', 'Schofield Tract', 'LAKE WALES RIDGE NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE', 'Platt Branch Mitigation Park Wildlife and Environmental Area', 'Fisheating Creek/Lykes Brothers Conservation Easement', 'Bright Hour Watershed', 'Fred C. Babcock-Cecil M. Webb Wildlife Management Area', or 'BICY'. PAD-US 4.0 is missing state wildlife management area boundaries in Oklahoma. Extract those from PAD 3.0 by using a combination of state name, designation, and GAP status criteria: State_Nm = 'OK' AND Loc_Ds = 'State Wildlife Management Area' AND GAP_Sts IN ('1','2'). Add the results to the polygons from PAD-US 4.0 generated in the previous step.Many areas of city-owned land in PAD-US are classified as GAP status 2, but don't appear to be managed for biodiversity. These are often golf courses, ball fields, and other recreational elements that are not beneficial for biodiversity. Further filter the merged PAD-US layer to include only GAP 2 city land (Mang_Name = 'CITY') if it has the following local designations: 'Conservation Area', 'Conservation Park', 'Local Conservation Area', 'Natural Area', 'Nature Park', 'Nature Preserve', 'Nature Reserve', 'Preserve', 'Regional Nature Preserve', 'Wildlife Area', or 'Wildlife Refuge'.Use the Region Group function to remove any single isolated likely grassland and savanna pixels. Single isolated pixels are often mapping errors that do not represent ecosystems within the intended scope of this indicator. The resulting layer represents likely grasslands.Use Region Group to separate patches of likely grassland and savanna that are >10 acres and those that are≤10 acres. Grassland birds like grasshopper sparrows avoid patches <10 acres (Dechant et al. 2002, Slater 2004). Assign those in >10 acre patches a value of 6 and those in <10 acre patches a value of 5.Use a Region Group function to identify likely grassland and savanna patches >5 acres to use as cores for identifying pollinator buffers. While important pollinators can persist in patches smaller than those needed for grasslands birds, larger patches are more likely to support the diversity of plants and nesting habitat needed to support a diverse pollinator community.Combine known grassland and savanna with likely grassland and savanna patches >5 acres into a single class to create pollinator buffers. Buffer by 300 m to align with foraging distances for solitary bees (Antoine and Forrest 2021, Zurbuchen et al. 2010).Use NLCD 2021 to remove any open water in the pollinator buffer. Assign the remaining pollinator buffer pixels a value of 4.Use Region Group to separate patches of likely grassland and savanna that are >10 acres and those that are≤10 acres. Grassland birds like grasshopper sparrows avoid patches <10 acres (Dechant et al. 2002, Slater 2004).Use LANDFIRE Biophysical Settings to create a raster of places with a historic fire interval (FRI_ALLFIR) of 9 years or less. That aligns with the role of regular fire in maintaining the grasslands and savannas of the Southeast.Add additional historic grassland and savanna areas where the LANDFIRE Biophysical Settings vegetation group (GROUPVEG) is either 'Savanna' or 'Grassland'. That adds other grasslands and savannas that are maintained by disturbance other than fire.Use 2021 NLCD to remove any areas classified as 95 Emergent Herbaceous Wetlands in the historic grasslands and savannas layer to remove fresh and saltwater marshes. Assign the remaining historic grasslands pixels a value of 1.Use conditional statements to combine all rasters together to get the final indicator values, ensuring that the highest value a pixel can have is retained.Adding zero values helps users better understand the extent of this indicator and makes this indicator layer perform better in online tools. Any pixel within the extent of the 2021 NLCD that receives a value in the landscape condition indicator, and is not already scored as grassland or savanna, receives a zero.As a final step, clip to the spatial extent of Southeast Blueprint 2024.Note: For more details on the mapping steps, code used to create this layer is available in theSoutheast Blueprint Data Downloadunder > 6_Code.Final indicator valuesIndicator values are assigned as follows: 7 = Known grassland/savanna 6 = Likely grassland/savanna >10 acres 5 = Likely grassland/savanna ≤10 acres 4 = Pollinator buffer around known or likely grassland/savanna 3 = Potential grassland/savanna in mostly natural landscape 2 = Potential grassland/savanna in more altered landscape 1 = Historic grassland/savanna 0 = Not identified as grassland/savannas Known IssuesSome known grassland and savanna locations are omitted due to confidentiality concerns around potential poaching and disturbance of rare plant species.Some important grasslands and savannas on private land and in protected areas managed for multiple use are under-prioritized.Some small areas of non-grassland and non-savanna are overprioritized due to the coarseness of the 30 m NLCD pixels. This often happens in places where a single pixel overlaps with both a dirt road and dense forest. That overlap makes it look like a savanna. Roadside edges in general are a challenge for this indicator. Roadsides can be important refugia for many grassland and savanna plants, so the indicator does not remove then. However, it also results in many roadsides being overprioritized.Some small areas of savanna and sections of powerline rights-of-way are underprioritized due to the coarseness of the 30 m NLCD pixels. This often happens where a single 30 m pixel overlaps with an area where >60% of the pixel looks forested, despite there being significant savanna-like openings in the remaining 40%.Some grasslands that have been fully invaded by shrubs other than mesquite are over prioritized.Known grassland locations at Key Cave National Wildlife Refuge in northern AL were provided by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service staff but inadvertently omitted during the indicator analysis. We intend to include these the next time the indicator is updated.Extent of historic grasslands and savannas in the parts of the Western Pennyroyal Plain in Kentucky may be underestimated. LANDFIRE predicts grassland and savanna in this area but also includes more extensive areas of wet forests with closed canopies than other sources. Much of this area is now converted to agriculture - making it more difficult to estimate historic conditions.This indicator overestimates likely grasslands in some areas in the Everglades Headwaters National Wildlife Refuge proclamation boundary. Many, but not all, pastures in that area function similarly to native grasslands.This indicator overestimates likely grasslands in some areas of beach without vegetation (e.g., Santa Rosa Island just west of Destin, FL). Methods to improve this issue in the future are under development.Disclaimer: Comparing with Older Indicator VersionsThere are numerous problems with using Southeast Blueprint indicators for change analysis. Please consult Blueprint staff if you would like to do this (emailhilary_morris@fws.gov).Literature CitedAntoine C. M., Forrest J. R. K. (2021). Nesting habitat of ground-nesting bees: a review. Ecol. Entomol. 46, 143-159. doi: 10.1111/een.12986. [https://resjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/een.12986].Dechant, J. A., M. L. Sondreal, D. H. Johnson, L. D. Igl, C. M. Goldade, M. P. Nenneman, and B. R. Euliss. 1998 (revised 2002). Effects of management practices on grassland birds: Grasshopper Sparrow. Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center, Jamestown, ND. 28 pages. [https://pubs.usgs.gov/unnumbered/93877/report.pdf].Dewitz, J., 2023, National Land Cover Database (NLCD) 2021 Products: U.S. Geological Survey data release. [https://doi.org/10.5066/P9JZ7AO3].Landscape Fire and Resource Management Planning Tools (LANDFIRE), Earth Resources Observation and Science Center (EROS), U.S. Geological Survey. Published 2022-09-28. LANDFIRE 2020 Biophysical Settings (BPS) CONUS. LF 2020. Raster digital data. Sioux Falls, SD. [https://www.landfire.gov/bps.php].Slater, G.L. (2004, October 7). Grasshopper Sparrow(Ammodramus savannarum): a technical conservation assessment. [Online]. USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Region. Accessed February 24, 2024. [https://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/stelprdb5182057.pdf].Southeast Conservation Adaptation Strategy. 2021. Recent Trends in Southeastern Ecosystems (2021): Measuring Progress toward the SECAS Goal. [https://secassoutheast.org/pdf/SECAS-goal-report-2021.pdf].U.S. Department of Agriculture, Natural Resources Conservation Service. 2010. Management considerations for grassland birds in northeastern haylands and pasturelands. Wildlife Insight. Washington, D.C. [https://www.bobolinkproject.com/docs/NRCS_Grassland_leaflet.pdf].U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Gap Analysis Project (GAP), 2022, Protected Areas Database of the United States (PAD-US) 3.0: U.S. Geological Survey data release. [https://doi.org/10.5066/P9Q9LQ4B].U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Gap Analysis Project (GAP), 2024, Protected Areas Database of the United States (PAD-US) 4: U.S. Geological Survey data release. [https://doi.org/10.5066/P96WBCHS].Yang, L., Jin, S., Danielson, P., Homer, C., Gass, L., Case, A., Costello, C., Dewitz, J., Fry, J., Funk, M., Grannemann, B., Rigge, M. and G. Xian. 2018. A New Generation of the United States National Land Cover Database: Requirements, Research Priorities, Design, and Implementation Strategies, ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing, 146, pp.108-123. [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isprsjprs.2018.09.006].Zurbuchen, A., Landert, L., Klaiber, J., Mueller, A., Hein, S., Dorn, S., 2010. Maximum foraging ranges in solitary bees: only few individuals have the capability to cover long foraging distances. Biol. Conserv. 143, 669-676. [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2009.12.003].
- Creator
- {'name': 'Department of the Interior'}
- Temporal Coverage
- Last modified 2025-03-04
- Date Issued
- 2024-07-15
- Rights
- The 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
- Imagery
- Language
- English
- Date Added
- October 26, 2024
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{'name': 'Department of the Interior'} (2024). Grasslands & Savannas (Southeast Blueprint Indicator) [U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service]. . https://gis-fws.opendata.arcgis.com/content/fws::grasslands-savannas-southeast-blueprint-indicator (imagery) -
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