ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT & CONSERVATION | Final Project

ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT & CONSERVATION

GEOG 483 | SP_2 2020 Project 9/10 Ross T. Rogers

TABLE OF CONTENTS PSUGIS CONSERVATION UNLIMITED

Candidate Wildlife Reserve Areas Candidate Bird Reserve Areas Candidate Mammalian Areas

Write-Ups

Discussion of Results

Summary of Analysis Screen Captures

Setup

Vector Analysis

Raster Analysis

Combination Analysis Findings

4 5 6 8 9 - 11 12 - 13 14 - 26 27 - 33 34 35

CANDIDATE WILDLIFE RESERVE AREAS CENTRE COUNTY, PA PSUGIS Conservation Unlimited was tasked by the Centre County Planning Office to identify candidate wildlife reserves areas within the county to assist in the Reserve System Proposal. The mission of the Reserve System Proposal is to help mitigate wildlife extinction due to human dominance.

The criteria designed to help identify lands available within the county consist of: • Greater Than or Equal To 70 Birds and Mammalian Species Combined • Less Than 10% of Each Study Area Occupied

by Buffered Roads-(20meters), Highway(50meters), and Interstate-(100meters) • High Habitat Potential • Publicly Owned Lands • Forested Areas • Slope Less Than 10%

Using this criteria PSUGIS Conservation Unlimited has identified over 53.4 sq. miles of candidate wildlife reserve areas within Centre County.

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CANDIDATE BIRD RESERVE AREAS CENTRE COUNTY, PA PSUGIS Conservation Unlimited was tasked by the Centre County Planning Office to identify candidate wildlife reserves areas within the county to assist in the Reserve System Proposal. The mission of the Reserve System Proposal is to help mitigate wildlife extinction due to human dominance.

The criteria designed to help identify lands available within the county consist of: • Greater Than or Equal To 70 Birds and Mammalian Species Combined • Less Than 10% of Each Study Area Occupied

by Buffered Roads-(20meters), Highway(50meters), and Interstate-(100meters) • High Habitat Potential • Publicly Owned Lands • Forested Areas • Slope Less Than 10%

Using this criteria PSUGIS Conservation Unlimited has identified over 53.4 sq. miles of candidate wildlife reserve areas within Centre County.

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CANDIDATE MAMMALIAN RESERVE AREAS CENTRE COUNTY, PA PSUGIS Conservation Unlimited was tasked by the Centre County Planning Office to identify candidate wildlife reserves areas within the county to assist in the Reserve System Proposal. The mission of the Reserve System Proposal is to help mitigate wildlife extinction due to human dominance.

The criteria designed to help identify lands available within the county consist of: • Greater Than or Equal To 70 Birds and Mammalian Species Combined • Less Than 10% of Each Study Area Occupied

by Buffered Roads-(20meters), Highway(50meters), and Interstate-(100meters) • High Habitat Potential • Publicly Owned Lands • Forested Areas • Slope Less Than 10%

Using this criteria PSUGIS Conservation Unlimited has identified over 53.4 sq. miles of candidate wildlife reserve areas within Centre County.

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DISCUSSION OF RESULTS The results derived by the criteria set forth did a good initial job of narrowing down candidate reserve areas. However, just displaying the final raster dataset as an overlay alone was lacking enough information to be informative to the Centre County Planning Office and felt it needed an additional index to help prioritize locations. That is why a quantile choropleth map overlay to identify lower and higher surveyed species density per Study Area was chosen with the candidate reserve ares. This way the Planning Office can make a more informative decision and prioritize the locations of based off multiple factors. To add to this narrative, two other similar maps prioritize birds and another that prioritized mammalian species. This way if the Planning Office wanted to prioritize one or the other, they could quickly identify the best regions per species. Also, by continuing to use the choropleth map developed and future study area surveys, the Planning Board would be able to track if their efforts to develop these reserve sites are making a difference.

Additional information and criteria, such as the following, would enhance the information available to assist the Planning Office in locating the optimal candidate reserve areas throughout the Centre county.

• Further define Public criteria or separate these into unique values to easily identify the difference: Not all public divisions are equal (Bureau of Forestry, Game Commission, and State Parks). All of these divisions operate differently in both environmentally and administratively ways. By identifying candidate reserve sites with the organization that manages the land, it would greatly assist the Centre County Planning Office once they start to socialize their Reserve System Proposal.

• Include buffer regions around urban areas: By including this buffer region it would directly address one of the main goals of the Reserve System proposal (mitigate species extinction due to human dominance.

• Include waterbodies and watersheds into the analysis: Water systems are an important part of any ecosystem and should be included in the analysis to the Reserve System Proposal. Without this information it leaves a major gap in helping identify the best regions. This could be in the form of a buffer criteria of waterbody or watershed.

• Identify and set a minimum area for candidate reserve areas: This would help eliminate smaller plots that have been identified through the current criteria.

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SUMMARY OF METHOD WHO: WHAT: WHEN: WHERE: WHY: CRITERIA:

DATA:

Centre County Planning Office & PSUGIS Conservation Unlimited

Identify lands within the county that meet specific criteria for candidate reserve areas Spring 2020

Centre County, PA. USA • • • •

• • • • •

Help mitigate species extinction due to human dominance Help local government officials make informed decisions with regard to the Reserve System Proposal

Greater Than or equal to 70 Birds and Mammalian Species Combined Less Than 10% of Each Study Area Occupied by Buffered Roads (20meters), Highway (50meters), and Interstate (100meters) Not within Road buffer High Habitat Potential Publicly Owned Lands Forested Areas Slope Less Than 10%

Vector:

Centre County Boundary – Shape Roads – Rd_type (Road, Highway, Interstate) Study Areas – Shape, Block_ID Ownership – Shape, Ownership (Public, Private) Habitat – Shape, Habitat Potential (Low, High)

Tabular:

Speciesrich survey – Block_ID, Birds, Mammals

Raster:

ANALYSIS: pg. 12 pg. 13

Vector: pg. 14

pg. 15

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Landuse – 50x50cell, type (Forest, Other, Ag, Urban) Elevation – 30x30cell (meters)

For this analysis, I used ArcGIS Pro. •

Import data given

• To mitigate distortion select local projection.

Ensure projection is set to NAD 1983 StatePlane Pennsylvania North FIPS 3701 (meters)

This analysis is broken into 3 phases. Working with vector data, then raster data, and combining the two findings together for the final solution.

• Find public lands

Select attribute: Ownership – Public Export | public • Find High Habitat potential

Select attribute: Habitat – High Export | HighPot

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Vector Cont.: pg. 16 • Find both Public & High Habitat Potential

Intersect: HighPot & public | Pub_HPot pg. 17

pg. 18

pg. 19

pg. 20

pg. 21

pg. 22 pg. 23 pg. 24

pg. 25 pg. 26 Raster pg. 27

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•

Join Study Areas with speciesrich by Block_ID

• Find Study Areas with 70+ birds and mammals combined Study Areas – New Field – (total species – long – numeric)

Field Calculator – Total Species = birds + mammals

• Find Study Areas with 70+ Combined species

Select attribute: Studyareas – Total Species - Greater than or equal to 70 Export | SA_70 • Create Road buffers

Roads – New Field – Buffer Distance (Float)

Field Calculator – Python code Buffdist= Reclass (!rd_type!)

Code Block def Reclass( rd_type ): if rd_type == Road: return 20 elif rd_type == Highway: return 50 elif rd_type == Interstate: return 100 else: return null

• Create Road Buffers

Buffer tool – Roads – Distance field (Buffer distance) – roads_Buff

*this will create a shapefile with an attribute field for area* • Create Road buffer per Study Area with 70+ species (SA_70)

Intersect – roads_buff and SA_70 | RBuff_SA70

• Find Study area with less than 10% occupied by road buffers

RBuff_SA70 – New Field (long – numeric – percentage) Total Road buffer percentage

Field Calculator - (!Shape_Area! / !Area!) * 100

Select by Attribute: Total Road buffer percentage less than 10% Export | Roadbuff_10less

• Remove Road buffers from Study Areas that have 70+ species and less than 10% covered by road buffers

Erase – SA_70 by RBuff_SA70 | SA_70_NoRdBuff

• Combine both the features (public and High habitat) and (Study Areas with 70+ species with less than 10% road buffers, and road buffers area not included)

Intersect – Pub_HPot and SA_70_NoRdBuff | Pub_Hpot_SA70rdbuff • Create raster from road buffer shapefile

Feature to Raster for roads_buff clip – cell 50 x 50 | Roadbuff_50 Ross T. Rogers - GEOG 483 SP_2 2020

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Raster Cont.: pg. 28 • Reclassify roadbuff for Raster calculator

Reclassify – roads = 0 : no data = 1 | RC_roadbuff_50 pg. 29 pg. 30 pg. 31 pg. 32 pg. 33 Vector & Raster pg. 34

SUMMARY: pg. 35

• Resample elevation to 50 x 50

Resample – elevation (nearest) cell 50 x 50 | elevation_RS_50 • Generate a slope analysis

Slope – percentage rise | slope_50

• Reclassify to display only less than 10% slope

Reclassify – 0-9.9999 = 1 : 9.9999-172.380646 = 0 | RC_slope_50 • Reclassify Landuse to find only forested areas

Reclassify – Forested = 1 : all other = 0 | RC_Forest

• Combine all reclassified rasters by criteria (forest, slope, and roadbuffers)

Raster Calculator = (RC_Forest x RC_Roadbuff_50 x RC_slope_50) | Slope_Forest_rdBuff • Combine both vector and raster analysis to meet all criteria.

Raster clip – Slope_Forest_rdBuff by Pub_Hpot_SArdbuff | Candidate_Res ***sites that meet all criteria, 50 x 50 cell, raster, meters***

At this point all data has been analyzed to meet given criteria for Candidate Reserve Areas. Running a zonal Geometry tool of the Candidate_Res raster will provide total area of Candidate Reserve Areas.

Candidate Reservations with Final Counts (50x50) Total= 55,336

Candidate Reserve Area is 138,340,000 sq. meters, which equals to slightly over 53.4 sq. miles.

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Import data given into ArcGIS Pro.

CRITERIA Publicly owned lands

High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10%

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Ensure projection is set to local.

NAD 1983 StatePlane Pennsylvania North FIPS 3701 (meters)

CRITERIA Publicly owned lands

High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

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Find Public lands

Ownership - Select attribute: Ownership – Public Export | public

CRITERIA

✓

Publicly owned lands

High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10%

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Find High Habitat Potential

Habitat - Select attribute: Habitat – High Export |High_pot

CRITERIA

✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

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Find both Public & High Habitat Potential

Intersect: HighPot and public

CRITERIA

✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10%

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Join Study Areas with Speciesrich

CRITERIA

✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

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Find Study Areas with 70+ Combined species

Create new field in Study Areas - Total Species

Calculate Field - Total Species = Birds + Mammals

CRITERIA

✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10%

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Find Study Areas with 70+ Combined species

Select attribute: Studyareas – Total Species - Greater than or equal to 70 Export | SA_70

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

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Create Road buffers

Roads – New Field – Buffer Distance (Float)

Field Calculator – Python code

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10%

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Create Road Buffers

Buffer tool – Roads – Distance field (Buffer distance) | Road_buff

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

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Create Road buffer per Study area with 70+

Intersect – Roads_buffer_dist and StudyAreas_70species | RBuff_SA70

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10%

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Find Study area with less than 10% occupied by road buffers

rbuff_SA70 – New Field (long – numeric – percentage) Total Road buffer percentage

Field Calculator - (!Shape_Area! / !Area!) * 100

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

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Find Study area with less than 10% occupied by road buffers

Select by Attribute: Total Road buffer percentage less than 10% Export | Roadbuff_10less

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10%

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Remove Road Buffers from Study Areas

Erase: SA_70 by RBuff_SA70 Output| SA_70_NoRdBuff

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

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Combine both the features (public and High habitat) and (Study Areas with 70+ species with less than 10% road buffers)

Intersect – Pub_HPot and SA_70_NoRdBuff | Pub_Hpot_SA70rdbuff

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

& Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

& Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10%

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Generate Raster Road buffer

Feature to Raster - roads_buff (50x50)cell

Output feature | Roadbuff_50

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

& Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

& Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

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Reclassify roadbuff for Raster calculator

Reclassify – roads = 0 : no data = 1 | RC_roadbuff_50

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

& Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

& Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10%

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Resample Elevation to 50 x 50 (cell size)

Resample– to 50x50 (nearest) | elevationF_RS_50

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

& Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

& Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

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Generate a slope analysis

Slope – percentage rise | slope_50

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

& Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

& Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10%

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Reclassify slope to display only less than 10

Reclassify – 0-9.9999 = 1 : 9.9999-172.380646=0 | RC_slope_50

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

& Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

& Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

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Reclassify Landuse to find only forested areas

Reclassify – Forested = 1 : all other = 0 | RC_Forest

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓

✓ ✓ 32

Ross T. Rogers - GEOG 483 SP_2 2020

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

& Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

& Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

Find less than 10% slope and Forest and not in road buffer

Raster Calculator = (RC_Forest x RC_Roadbuff_50 x RC_slope_50) | Slope_Forest_rdBuff

CRITERIA

✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ 04MAY2020

Ross T. Rogers - GEOG 483 SP_2 2020

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

& Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

& Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates Forested areas

& Slope less than 10%

33

Combine both vector analysis and raster to meet all criteria

Raster clip – Slope_Forest_rdBuff by Pub_Hpot_SA70rdbuff | Candidate_Res

✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ 34

Ross T. Rogers - GEOG 483 SP_2 2020

CRITERIA

Publicly owned lands

& High Habitat Potential

& Greater than 70 birds and mammalian species combined

& Less than 10% of each study area occupied by buffered roads, highways, and interstates

& Forested areas

& Slope less than 10% 04MAY2020

Candidate Reservations with Final Counts (50x50) Total= 55336

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