Context

Maintaining connectivity in landscapes where natural ecosystems are quickly replaced by human land-uses is a challenge. To reduce the effects of habitat loss, ecological corridors have been proposed as a relevant tool for landscape planning.

Objective

We aimed to develop a spatial model to identify and prioritize riparian corridors to improve landscape connectivity.

Methods

The model considers the effect of the land-use/cover types and remaining forests on the movement capacity of a focal species sensitive to fragmentation. Since landscape elements act as barriers or promoters to ecological fluxes, suitability values were set according to the element’s ability in providing habitat. The model recognizes the effect of the contact between associated elements along the riparian corridor’s width and length and corrects their suitability. These procedures enabled the calculation of the Utility Factor, resulting in a measure of the quality of the corridor.

Results

The results show that the model assists the identification of the riparian corridor’s sections where connectivity is hampered and management efforts are required to maintain landscape connectivity. In addition, it can be applied to select the corridors dominated by large forests, which could be designed for conservation purposes. The two study cases evidence that the model is flexible, adjustable to distinct landscapes, and the decision-maker’s objectives.

Conclusions

We concluded that the proposed strategy helps decision-makers to prioritize the territories for managing or preserving connectivity. Finally, the method provides quantitative information that would not be perceived by just interpreting land-use/cover maps.

中文翻译：

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生态廊道与景观规划：连通性维护优先区域选择模型

语境

在自然生态系统很快被人类土地利用所取代的景观中保持连通性是一项挑战。为了减少栖息地丧失的影响，生态廊道已被提议作为景观规划的相关工具。

客观的

我们旨在开发一个空间模型来识别和优先考虑河岸走廊，以改善景观连通性。

方法

该模型考虑了土地利用/覆盖类型和剩余森林对对破碎敏感的焦点物种的运动能力的影响。由于景观元素充当生态通量的障碍或促进者，因此根据元素提供栖息地的能力来设定适宜性值。该模型识别沿河岸走廊宽度和长度的相关元素之间接触的影响，并修正它们的适用性。这些程序可以计算效用系数，从而衡量走廊的质量。

结果

结果表明，该模型有助于识别河岸走廊的连通性受阻且需要管理工作以保持景观连通性的部分。此外，它还可以应用于选择以大森林为主的走廊，可以为保护目的而设计。这两个研究案例证明该模型是灵活的，可根据不同的景观和决策者的目标进行调整。

结论

我们得出的结论是，拟议的战略有助于决策者优先考虑管理或保持连通性的领土。最后，该方法提供了仅通过解释土地利用/覆盖图无法感知的定量信息。