INHABIT: A web-based decision support tool for invasive plant species habitat visualization and assessment across the contiguous United States
Many managers are hampered by the scope of the invasive species problem compared to their available resources. Habitat suitability models of invaders can help fill this resource gap, helping with activities such as watch list compilation and targeted surveillance and eradication efforts.
USGS has formed a scientist-practitioner partnership to create suitability models for manager-identified priority terrestrial invasive plant species and deliver them via the Invasive Species Habitat Tool (INHABIT; https://gis.usgs.gov/inhabit), a publicly available web application with current geographic coverage across the contiguous United States. Our overall objective is to develop state-of-the-art risk assessment tools to inform prevention and early detection efforts of high-risk terrestrial invasive plant species. INHABIT provides practical information for over 200 invasive plant species, including downloadable maps and detailed tabular summaries of invasion risk for over 4,000 management units for federal land management agencies and U.S. counties. The maps can help prioritize control efforts by providing information on the scope of potential invasions and providing national and regional context to local invasions. Summaries of invasion risk and distance to known populations within focal management units can inform watch list creation for EDRR activities. INHABIT is in active development, with regular updates to models and functionality to better support the prevention and management of terrestrial invasive plant species.
We are working to deliver enhanced model outputs that focus on areas of higher impact and include newly established invasive species. Existing models predict suitability for occurrence based on location information within the contiguous US. Ongoing work will produce suitability models for different levels of abundance, as greater abundance relates to greater impact from invaders. We are working on fitting models with information from the globe for very recent plant invaders, or national scale ‘Early Detection and Rapid Response’ species, and high-risk species identified through horizon scanning.
We want to also predict the current distribution of abundant phenologically-distinct invasive plant species. We will use phenological information and remotely-sensed data with high temporal and spatial resolution, such as images from the recently launched Landsat 9, to map where species occur on the landscape. We can then compare our thresholded abundance models predicting habitat suitability to these newly derived maps predicting current distribution. The model results will help refine watch lists by targeting species that are predicted to become abundant, in addition to considering distance to recorded populations.
All of these elements will be incorporated into the INHABIT web tool through a coproduction process with managers, focusing on derived outputs that can help inform management decisions. This tool has been developed to share maps for species and tabular summaries of results for models of relative habitat suitability to inform actionable and forward-looking watch lists to aid surveillance to prevent establishment of novel invaders and inform early detection efforts. INHABIT helps managers decide which species to search for and where to direct search and control efforts.
Many managers are hampered by the scope of the invasive species problem compared to their available resources. Habitat suitability models of invaders can help fill this resource gap, helping with activities such as watch list compilation and targeted surveillance and eradication efforts.
USGS has formed a scientist-practitioner partnership to create suitability models for manager-identified priority terrestrial invasive plant species and deliver them via the Invasive Species Habitat Tool (INHABIT; https://gis.usgs.gov/inhabit), a publicly available web application with current geographic coverage across the contiguous United States. Our overall objective is to develop state-of-the-art risk assessment tools to inform prevention and early detection efforts of high-risk terrestrial invasive plant species. INHABIT provides practical information for over 200 invasive plant species, including downloadable maps and detailed tabular summaries of invasion risk for over 4,000 management units for federal land management agencies and U.S. counties. The maps can help prioritize control efforts by providing information on the scope of potential invasions and providing national and regional context to local invasions. Summaries of invasion risk and distance to known populations within focal management units can inform watch list creation for EDRR activities. INHABIT is in active development, with regular updates to models and functionality to better support the prevention and management of terrestrial invasive plant species.
We are working to deliver enhanced model outputs that focus on areas of higher impact and include newly established invasive species. Existing models predict suitability for occurrence based on location information within the contiguous US. Ongoing work will produce suitability models for different levels of abundance, as greater abundance relates to greater impact from invaders. We are working on fitting models with information from the globe for very recent plant invaders, or national scale ‘Early Detection and Rapid Response’ species, and high-risk species identified through horizon scanning.
We want to also predict the current distribution of abundant phenologically-distinct invasive plant species. We will use phenological information and remotely-sensed data with high temporal and spatial resolution, such as images from the recently launched Landsat 9, to map where species occur on the landscape. We can then compare our thresholded abundance models predicting habitat suitability to these newly derived maps predicting current distribution. The model results will help refine watch lists by targeting species that are predicted to become abundant, in addition to considering distance to recorded populations.
All of these elements will be incorporated into the INHABIT web tool through a coproduction process with managers, focusing on derived outputs that can help inform management decisions. This tool has been developed to share maps for species and tabular summaries of results for models of relative habitat suitability to inform actionable and forward-looking watch lists to aid surveillance to prevent establishment of novel invaders and inform early detection efforts. INHABIT helps managers decide which species to search for and where to direct search and control efforts.