Landscape Resilience in a Changing Climate: From Concepts to Action - Tosha Comendant, Conservation Science Manager, Pepperwood Foundation This presentation was given during a workshop at the Bay Area Open Space Council's March Gathering on Thursday, March 15, 2018 at the David Brower Center in Berkeley, CA.

1. Building resilience through
landscape connectivity
March 15, 2018
Tosha Comendant, Pepperwood Foundation
Morgan Gray, Lisa Micheli, Adina Merenlender (UC Berkeley)

2. Keeping landscapes connected is the #1
science-based recommendation for
maintaining landscape resilience in
the face of climate change
(Heller and Zavaleta 2009)
How can we evaluate climate benefits and
enhance connectivity at the parcel scale to
achieve shared conservation outcomes?

3. Building habitat connectivity for climate adaptation
Mayacamas to Berryessa Coast Ranges, California
A California Landscape Conservation Cooperative place-based adaptation project

4. • Convened land managers from Sonoma, Napa, Lake, and
Mendocino for a regional collaboration to assess terrestrial
and riparian potential linkages
• Quantified climate benefits of potential linkages
• Facilitated, practitioner-driven prioritization of potential
linkages to select habitat corridor project
What we did:
• Generate a habitat corridor map for the region
• Create corridors based on species models
• Rank potential linkages
• Tell practitioners to adopt a set of management objectives
What we did not do:

5. Potential terrestrial and riparian linkage
pathways between existing protected lands

6. Utilizing consistent terminology
Broad region of
connectivity
Priority protection
areas on ground
Path that costs
the least
Potential linkages Least cost paths Corridors

7. Gray, Micheli, and Merenlender (unpublished)
Building habitat connectivity for climate adaptation
Mayacamas to Berryessa Coast Ranges, California
Direction to
move to cooler
climates in
summer
Direction to
move to cooler
climates in
winter
Climate gradients at this
scale run from coast to
valley, not North to South!
Zones of “novel” high temperatures
projected for 2050
Unprecedented summer heat
Unprecedented winter warmth
Study area
Protected lands

8. Tool kit for practitioners:
A parcel-scale evaluation of the potential linkage
Least cost path
& potential
linkage
Summarize climate &
connectivity variables
Identify area of
interest and
priority corridor

9. Key findings from this climate connectivity assessment
• Riparian linkages are
complementary to terrestrial
linkages and do not overlap
– Terrestrial linkages designed to
avoid the built environment
– Riparian linkages in valleys
• Locations where both terrestrial
and riparian connectivity co-occur
should be prioritized for
conservation planning
Climate analyses
• Summer and winter temperatures
must be evaluated independently in
locations with topographic and
climatic diversity
• Different future climate spaces
for summer and winter
• Different linkages offer the
greatest climate benefit for
summer and winter
Connectivity analyses

10. Coast to Valley
Landscape Connectivity Network
Critical partnerships
• Local, state, & federal parks
• Land trusts
• Tribes
• Water districts
• CalTrans
• Land use & transportation
planners
• Non-profit organizations
• Universities and schools
Phase 1
Mayacamas to
Berryessa
Phase 2
Sonoma &
Mendocino
Phase 3
Marin

11. Connecting cameras and corridors
Camera arrays can validate
wildlife use of corridors
Planned array

12. Tosha Comendant
tcomendant@pepperwoodreserve.org
Thank you for
your critical support!