Land cover change is one of the fundamental measures for understanding pressures on ecosystems and is widely used to understand the consequences to biodiversity and ecosystem services. This study utilizes land cover and other associated socioeconomic and environmental data to examine the consequences of land cover change in human-dominated landscapes, and how provisioning of ecosystem services changes over space and time. It also develops high-quality land change information at regional scales and uses these empirical records to investigate the consequences on a variety of ecosystem properties. This project is currently focusing on (1) lands that support monarch butterfly migrations and (2) ecosystem services in urbanizing regions.
Monarch Butterflies
The North American monarch population has two migratory populations. The smaller western population overwinters in coastal California and migrates north-eastward into western states to reproduce. The larger eastern population overwinters in high-elevation fir forests in Mexico and spreads northward across the eastern US and Canada. The annual migrations take place over multiple generations, and adults from the final generation go into reproductive diapause before flying to their overwintering locations. Both populations have declined in the last 20 years, with population models suggesting the loss of both the east and west migratory processes a distinct possibility (Semmens et al. 2016, Schultz et al. 2017). Our research focuses on land use and land cover and urbanization impacts on monarchs in three regions: Texas and Mexico migratory habitat, Coastal California overwintering and breeding habitat, and the midwestern US breeding habitat.
Ecosystem services in urbanizing regions
In urban areas, trees, parks, and other natural vegetation provide ecosystem services to people, cooling cities, mitigating flooding, reducing air and water pollution, providing recreational opportunities, and supporting human health and well-being. These benefits vary depending on the ecological, social, and technical context where they occur and are most directly felt where Americans live in close proximity to natural vegetation, which includes both densely settled urban areas and Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI) areas where lower-density housing is intermingled with extensive forests and rangelands. Given the large number of people in cities, and their direct interaction with ecological systems, urban and WUI areas are a natural focus for studies of ecosystem services.
The ARIES (Artificial Intelligence for Ecosystem Services) software platform uses a semantic architecture in a web-based system of interoperable data to allow users to develop or select already-developed models depending on their location and the ecosystem service being modelled. Our project’s goal is to develop urban ecosystem service accounts and a suite of urban ecosystem models in ARIES and apply them to historic land cover change data to investigate changes in urban ecosystem services through time. The broader theme of the work, the consequences of land cover change, may result in studies that are unrelated, for example urban heat island mitigation as an ecosystem service vs. changes in monarch migratory habitat in Texas. However, there are strong ties between urbanization, monarchs, and ecosystem service provisioning and we are performing research related to these interactions.
Land cover change is one of the fundamental measures for understanding pressures on ecosystems and is widely used to understand the consequences to biodiversity and ecosystem services. This study utilizes land cover and other associated socioeconomic and environmental data to examine the consequences of land cover change in human-dominated landscapes, and how provisioning of ecosystem services changes over space and time. It also develops high-quality land change information at regional scales and uses these empirical records to investigate the consequences on a variety of ecosystem properties. This project is currently focusing on (1) lands that support monarch butterfly migrations and (2) ecosystem services in urbanizing regions.
Monarch Butterflies
The North American monarch population has two migratory populations. The smaller western population overwinters in coastal California and migrates north-eastward into western states to reproduce. The larger eastern population overwinters in high-elevation fir forests in Mexico and spreads northward across the eastern US and Canada. The annual migrations take place over multiple generations, and adults from the final generation go into reproductive diapause before flying to their overwintering locations. Both populations have declined in the last 20 years, with population models suggesting the loss of both the east and west migratory processes a distinct possibility (Semmens et al. 2016, Schultz et al. 2017). Our research focuses on land use and land cover and urbanization impacts on monarchs in three regions: Texas and Mexico migratory habitat, Coastal California overwintering and breeding habitat, and the midwestern US breeding habitat.
Ecosystem services in urbanizing regions
In urban areas, trees, parks, and other natural vegetation provide ecosystem services to people, cooling cities, mitigating flooding, reducing air and water pollution, providing recreational opportunities, and supporting human health and well-being. These benefits vary depending on the ecological, social, and technical context where they occur and are most directly felt where Americans live in close proximity to natural vegetation, which includes both densely settled urban areas and Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI) areas where lower-density housing is intermingled with extensive forests and rangelands. Given the large number of people in cities, and their direct interaction with ecological systems, urban and WUI areas are a natural focus for studies of ecosystem services.
The ARIES (Artificial Intelligence for Ecosystem Services) software platform uses a semantic architecture in a web-based system of interoperable data to allow users to develop or select already-developed models depending on their location and the ecosystem service being modelled. Our project’s goal is to develop urban ecosystem service accounts and a suite of urban ecosystem models in ARIES and apply them to historic land cover change data to investigate changes in urban ecosystem services through time. The broader theme of the work, the consequences of land cover change, may result in studies that are unrelated, for example urban heat island mitigation as an ecosystem service vs. changes in monarch migratory habitat in Texas. However, there are strong ties between urbanization, monarchs, and ecosystem service provisioning and we are performing research related to these interactions.