Irvine Ranch Conservancy Monitoring on the IRNL HABITATS

Irvine Ranch Conservancy Monitoring on the IRNL

HABITATS

Conservation Targets Compliance Management Actions

Climate Change ? Invasive Species g Loss of Predators Smo Human Access ↑ FIRE FREQUENCY Habitat Loss & Degradation

IRC MONITORING APPROACH n We try to make monitoring QUESTIONBASED and informative for adaptive management

Measure Success of Our Adaptive Management in: – Increasing native habitat diversity, structure & function – Decreasing key invasive species – Decreasing impacts of frequent fires – Maintaining wildlife & sensitive species – Minimizing human access impacts

BIODIVERSITY AND SYSTEM HEALTH What are thresholds for community stability and resilience in relation to relative levels of non-native abundance and to other threats? USGS USG

BIODIVERSITY AND SYSTEM HEALTH n Habitat-specific long-term monitoring (CSS, oak woodland, perennial grassland) n Invasive species surveys n Vegetation mapping n Aerial photo analysis / long-term photos n Floristic inventories (post-fire / opportunistic) n Wildlife monitoring

Habitat Monitoring n CSS – Transects across a gradient of cover – Transects within burned and unburned CSS (SDNHM small mammal arrays) – Other long-term transects? n Grassland – Polygon-level post-fire grassland survey n Oak woodland

Restoration Monitoring • Point intercept transects • CNPS rapid assessments • Quadrats • Photo-points • Some external soil flora monitoring • Arthropod monitoring

Invasive Surveys

Sensitive Plant/Floristic Surveys

BIODIVERSITY AND SYSTEM HEALTH n Periodic small mammal surveys (post-fire and 3 -5 yr) n Raptor surveys (annual) n Wildlife activity (quarterly) n External surveys (e. g. , Sea and Sage quarterly bird counts) n Luxury surveys – Trapdoor spiders – Butterfly transects

STRESSORS AND IMPACTS n Wildfire occurrence/extent/impact – On wildlife, rodents, raptors, habitat etc. n Human recreation impacts n Wildlife response to stressors

How does human activity affect wildlife activity, movement patterns, and persistence? How do these patterns vary over spatial scale and over shorter versus longer term time frames? Prop. Days Obs. 0. 05 MOUNTAIN LION χ2 = 81. 79, df = 2, P < 0. 01 0 None 1 -5 >5 Daily Human Access

FOCAL RESOURCES

OUR LONG-TERM NEEDS n Long-term and experimental data to address management concerns about habitat trajectories. n Collaboration with establishing, maintaining and analyzing long-term studies designed to address both management and fundamental research questions. n Updates to researcher study sites and findings.