It’s Our Nature to Know Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute Current and Future Biodiversity Intactness Assessment of the OSLI LEAP Project Tom Habib & Dan Farr Algar Steering Committee December 3, 2013 It’s Our Nature to Know Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute

2 ABMI Monitoring: Biodiversity Species/features Surveyed Species Mosses Lichens Birds Mammals Mites Aquatic Inverts Habitat Structures Soil Trees Logs/Snags Wetlands

Human Footprint mapping Energy Forestry Agriculture Urban & rural residences Industrial facilities Transportation Validated against SPOT Imagery ABMI Monitoring: Human Footprint

% Human Footprint % Human Footprint % Human Footprint Developing a Currency: Biodiversity Intactness Index Difference between current and “Reference” (i.e. de-footprinted) abundance Not an absolute measure of biodiversity

6 Algar Study Region Total area ~570 km 2 Current human footprint: 2.51% Footprint after restoration: 2.20%

7 Current Biodiversity Intactness

8 Guild Intactness: Current Species Group Predicted Intactness: Current Lower 90% Confidence Interval Upper 90% Confidence Interval Birds96.47% (OA)95.22%87.44% (OA) Plants92.56% (OA)91.27%81.55% (OA) Mites96.81%88.30%93.61% Mosses96.32%90.24%95.25% (OA) Mammals97.64% 97.12%96.64% (OA) ALL95.96% (OA) 92.43% 90.90% (OA)

9 Guild Intactness: Change Species Group Change in Predicted Intactness Lower 90% Confidence Interval Upper 90% Confidence Interval Birds0.87%0.59%1.22% Plants1.01%0.79%1.27% Mites0.79%0.35%1.34% Mosses0.80%0.50%1.25% Mammals0.37%0.26%0.52% ALL0.77%0.50%1.12%

10 Biodiversity Intactness Analysis Predicted ChangeCurrent Intactness

11 Thank Find us online at Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute