Modeling spatial variation in density of golden eagle nest sites in the western United States


Autoři: Jeffrey R. Dunk aff001;  Brian Woodbridge aff002;  Todd M. Lickfett aff003;  Geoffrey Bedrosian aff003;  Barry R. Noon aff004;  David W. LaPlante aff005;  Jessi L. Brown aff006;  Jason D. Tack aff007
Působiště autorů: Department of Environmental Science and Management, Humboldt State University, Arcata, CA, United States of America aff001;  U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Corvallis, Oregon, United States of America aff002;  U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Denver Federal Center, Denver, Colorado, United States of America aff003;  Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology and Graduate Degree Program in Ecology, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, United States of America aff004;  Natural Resource Geospatial, Montague, CA, United States of America aff005;  Department of Biology, University of Nevada Reno, Reno, NV, United States of America aff006;  U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Missoula, Montana, United States of America aff007
Vyšlo v časopise: PLoS ONE 14(9)
Kategorie: Research Article
doi: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0223143

Souhrn

In order to contribute to conservation planning efforts for golden eagles (Aquila chrysaetos) in the western U.S., we developed nest site models using >6,500 nest site locations throughout a >3,483,000 km2 area of the western U.S. We developed models for twelve discrete modeling regions, and estimated relative density of nest sites for each region. Cross-validation showed that, in general, models accurately estimated relative nest site densities within regions and sub-regions. Areas estimated to have the highest densities of breeding golden eagles had from 132–2,660 times greater densities compared to the lowest density areas. Observed nest site densities were very similar to those reported from published studies. Large extents of each modeling region consisted of low predicted nest site density, while a small percentage of each modeling region contained disproportionately high nest site density. For example, we estimated that areas with relative nest density values <0.3 represented from 62.8–97.8% (x¯ = 82.5%) of each modeling area, and those areas contained from 14.7–30.0% (x¯ = 22.1%) of the nest sites. In contrast, areas with relative nest density values >0.5 represented from 1.0–12.8% (x¯ = 6.3%) of modeling areas, and those areas contained from 47.7–66.9% (x¯ = 57.3%) of the nest sites. Our findings have direct application to: 1) large-scale conservation planning efforts, 2) risk analyses for land-use proposals such as recreational trails or wind power development, and 3) identifying mitigation areas to offset the impacts of human disturbance.

Klíčová slova:

California – Conservation science – Habitats – Landforms – Eagles – Deserts – Plateaus – Wind power


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