Saira Haider is a quantitative ecologist that develops ecological models and provides decision support tools for natural resource managers, primarily in Florida's Everglades.
Before joining USGS, Saira worked in central Mexico on payments for ecosystem services and grassroots conservation efforts. She completed her Master's of Environmental Management at the Nicholas School of the Environment, where her research focused on the impacts of climate change on the livelihoods of small holder coffee producers in Latin America.
Education and Certifications
M.E.M., Ecosystem Science and Conservation, Nicholas School of the Environment, Duke University, 2015
B.A., Physics with minors in Mathematics and Environmental Science, Knox College, 2010
Science and Products
Engaging Indigenous Communities to Co-Design a Real-time Monitoring Application to Protect Everglades Tree Islands
Comparing EverForecast to the South Florida Water Management District’s Position Analysis
Engaging Indigenous Communities to Co-Design a Real-time Monitoring Application to Protect their Socio-Cultural and Ecological Areas
Knowledge Synthesis of Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow Science
Ecological Modeling in Support of the Lake Okeechobee Water Management
Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN)
NexView: Empowering decision makers to assess the impacts of development on social-ecological systems in the Lower Mekong River Basin by increasing access with integrated and visualized data, models, and decision making tools
Modeling Conservation Targets for the Peninsular Florida Landscape Conservation Cooperative
Multispecies Operational Forecasting in the Florida Everglades
Modeling Spatial Habitat Quality for the Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow
Ecological Modeling in Support of the Western Everglades Restoration Project
Evaluating Ecological Vulnerabilities of the Greater Everglades Ecosystem to Provide Decision Support for Restoration
Everglades Vulnerability Analysis (EVA) modeling scripts and output
KiteNest modeling scripts and output
Sea level rise scenarios for the Cape Sable seaside sparrow
Ecological modeling output for the Lake Okeechobee System Operating Manual iteration 3 (of 3), 2022
Ecological modeling output for the Lake Okeechobee System Operating Manual iterations 1 and 2 (of 3), 2021
Ecological Model Support for the Western Everglades Restoration Project (WERP) Round One of Four, 2018
Ecological Model Support for the Western Everglades Restoration Project (WERP) Round Two of Four, 2018
Ecological Model Support for the Western Everglades Restoration Project (WERP) Round Three of Four, 2019
Ecological Model Support for the Western Everglades Restoration Project (WERP) Round Four of Four, 2020
Ecological Model Support for RECOVER's Update of Interim Goals, 2019
Multiple Species Comparisons from EverForecast May 2021
Digital Elevation Model (DEM) at 50 m resolution for the Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN)
The Everglades vulnerability analysis: Linking ecological models to support ecosystem restoration
Nest-site selection model for endangered Everglade snail kites to inform ecosystem restoration
Sea level rise may pose conservation challenges for the endangered Cape Sable seaside sparrow
Managing multiple species with conflicting needs in the Greater Everglades
Landscape-scale drivers of endangered Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow (Ammospiza maritima mirabilis) presence using an ensemble modeling approach
The Everglades vulnerability analysis—Integrating ecological models and addressing uncertainty
Knowledge synthesis of Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow science
EverForecast—A near-term forecasting application for ecological decision support
The Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN) surface-water interpolation model, version 3
Near-term spatial hydrologic forecasting in Everglades, USA for landscape planning and ecological forecasting
Potential impacts of future urbanization and sea level rise on Florida’s natural resources
Managing conflicts in the River of Grass
Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) NetCDF R Package
EDEN: Everglades Depth Estimation Network Water Level And Depth Surfaces
EDEN
This package provides a set of functions for the Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN).
Science and Products
- Science
Filter Total Items: 13
Engaging Indigenous Communities to Co-Design a Real-time Monitoring Application to Protect Everglades Tree Islands
USGS will collaborate with the Miccosukee and Seminole Tribes to co-design a dashboard mock-up for a real-time web application that monitors tree island health in the Everglades.Comparing EverForecast to the South Florida Water Management District’s Position Analysis
USGS will compare the EverForecast hydrologic forecast, the South Florida Water Management District's Position Analysis, and observed water level recordings from gages located across the Everglades landscape to examine which forecast performs better during the wet and dry seasons; wet, dry, or average years; or in different areas of the Everglades.Engaging Indigenous Communities to Co-Design a Real-time Monitoring Application to Protect their Socio-Cultural and Ecological Areas
Everglades tree islands are traditional homes of the Miccosukee and Seminole Tribes and contain their ancestral remains, but no monitoring tool exists for water managers to protect sites from destructive flooding. We propose stakeholder workshops to codesign a monitoring application with the Tribes.Knowledge Synthesis of Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow Science
WARC researchers have developed a literature review of science on the Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow focused on topics relevant to upcoming management decisions.Ecological Modeling in Support of the Lake Okeechobee Water Management
The Joint Ecosystem Modeling team will be running a suite of ecological models to evaluate scenarios and provide insight into how alternative restorations plans compare, indicate whether alternatives could lead to unintended consequences, and determine effects of alternatives that could conflict with other goals.Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN)
In the early 2000s, USGS developed the Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN) to provide water-level data for scientists, decision-makers, and managers to help monitor and assess Everglades restoration. EDEN is a real-time integrated network of 275 water-level gages, water-surface models, and applications that provides 400 x 400 meter gridded daily water-level data across the freshwater part...NexView: Empowering decision makers to assess the impacts of development on social-ecological systems in the Lower Mekong River Basin by increasing access with integrated and visualized data, models, and decision making tools
The NexView integrated decision framework will facilitate informed discussions and decisions by enabling policy makers to manipulate and explore multiple decision scenarios and understand the impacts of these decision alternatives before decisions are made.Modeling Conservation Targets for the Peninsular Florida Landscape Conservation Cooperative
The USGS is working with the Peninsular Florida Landscape Conservation Cooperative to develop forecast models that integrate potential impacts from external drivers for selected conservation targets and priority resources.Multispecies Operational Forecasting in the Florida Everglades
A USGS forecasting tool helps Everglades natural resource managers identify management actions that can benefit one or more species while quantifying the potential costs to others.Modeling Spatial Habitat Quality for the Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow
The Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) team will develop species distribution models that incorporate hydrologic and habitat variables known to influence Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow occurrence.Ecological Modeling in Support of the Western Everglades Restoration Project
Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) provides ecological models tailored to address specific management issues, for example, the Western Everglades Restoration Project.Evaluating Ecological Vulnerabilities of the Greater Everglades Ecosystem to Provide Decision Support for Restoration
USGS scientists develop decision support tools to help inform management and restoration of the Greater Everglades Ecosystem. - Data
Filter Total Items: 17
Everglades Vulnerability Analysis (EVA) modeling scripts and output
The Everglades Vulnerability Analysis (EVA) is a series of connected Bayesian networks that models the landscape-scale response of indicators of Everglades ecosystem health to changes in hydrology and salinity on the landscape. Using the uncertainty built into each network, it also produces surfaces of vulnerability in relation to user-defined ‘ideal’ outcomes. This dataset includes thKiteNest modeling scripts and output
KiteNest is a spatially explicit model of Everglades snail kite (Rostrhamus sociabilis plumbeus) relative nest site selection that quantifies the relationships between a range of environmental factors and nest site selection specific to the southern portion of the species' range. Using hydrologic conditions such as mean 2-week water depth and water depth change rate, days since the last fire, distSea level rise scenarios for the Cape Sable seaside sparrow
The endangered Cape Sable seaside sparrow (Ammospiza maritima mirabilis; CSSS) occurs in marl prairie habitat at the southern end of the Everglades, at the southernmost part of the Florida peninsula. The locations of three of its six subpopulations are proximate to the coast, putting them at risk for inundation caused by sea level rise (SLR). The spatially explicit predictive model EverSparrow proEcological modeling output for the Lake Okeechobee System Operating Manual iteration 3 (of 3), 2022
Ecological models facilitate the evaluation and assessment of alternative approaches to restore the Greater Everglades ecosystem. Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) provides ecological models tailored to address specific management issues. The multi-agency REstoration, COordination and VERification (RECOVER) science team uses ecological models (i.e., ecological planning tools) to evaluate the potentiaEcological modeling output for the Lake Okeechobee System Operating Manual iterations 1 and 2 (of 3), 2021
Ecological models facilitate the evaluation and assessment of alternative approaches to restore the Greater Everglades ecosystem. Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) provides ecological models tailored to address specific management issues. The multi-agency REstoration, COordination and VERification (RECOVER) science team uses ecological models (i.e., ecological planning tools) to evaluate the potentiaEcological Model Support for the Western Everglades Restoration Project (WERP) Round One of Four, 2018
Ecological models facilitate evaluation and assessment of alternative approaches to restore the Greater Everglades ecosystem. However, the provision of useful and accessible models is a challenge because there is often a disconnect between model output and its use by decision makers. Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) meets this challenge by providing ecological model output tailored to management decEcological Model Support for the Western Everglades Restoration Project (WERP) Round Two of Four, 2018
Ecological models facilitate evaluation and assessment of alternative approaches to restore the Greater Everglades ecosystem. However, the provision of useful and accessible models is a challenge because there is often a disconnect between model output and its use by decision makers. Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) meets this challenge by providing ecological model output tailored to management decEcological Model Support for the Western Everglades Restoration Project (WERP) Round Three of Four, 2019
Ecological models facilitate evaluation and assessment of alternative approaches to restore the Greater Everglades ecosystem. However, the provision of useful and accessible models is a challenge because there is often a disconnect between model output and its use by decision makers. Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) meets this challenge by providing ecological model output tailored to management decEcological Model Support for the Western Everglades Restoration Project (WERP) Round Four of Four, 2020
Ecological models facilitate evaluation and assessment of alternative approaches to restore the Greater Everglades ecosystem. However, the provision of useful and accessible models is a challenge because there is often a disconnect between model output and its use by decision makers. Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) meets this challenge by providing ecological model output tailored to management decEcological Model Support for RECOVER's Update of Interim Goals, 2019
Ecological models facilitate evaluation and assessment of alternative approaches to restore the Greater Everglades ecosystem. However, the provision of useful and accessible models is a challenge because there is often a disconnect between model output and its use by decision makers. Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) meets this challenge by providing ecological model output tailored to management decMultiple Species Comparisons from EverForecast May 2021
These data are summaries and comparisons of the EverForecast outputs from May 2021. EverForecast is a near-term hydrologic forecasting application that provides daily water depth forecasts across the freshwater Everglades (Pearlstine et al. 2020); water depth forecasts are then used to run species models. Here, we examine the EverForecast outputs of five species models: (1) American alligator prodDigital Elevation Model (DEM) at 50 m resolution for the Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN)
Since its inception, the Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN) has used the High Accuracy Elevation Dataset (HAED) digital elevation model (DEM) to provide scientists and managers with continuous water depth surfaces, derived from interpolated water stage, on a 400 X 400 meter grid. A new, high resolution LiDAR-based DEM is available through a collaboration between Everglades National Park (E - Publications
The Everglades vulnerability analysis: Linking ecological models to support ecosystem restoration
Understanding of the Everglades’ ecological vulnerabilities and restoration needs has advanced over the past decade but has not been applied in an integrated manner. To address this need, we developed the Everglades Vulnerability Analysis (EVA), a decision support tool that uses modular Bayesian networks to predict the ecological outcomes of a subset of the ecosystem’s health indicators. This toolAuthorsLaura D'Acunto, Leonard G. Pearlstine, Saira Haider, Caitlin E. Hackett, Dilip Shinde, Stephanie RomanachNest-site selection model for endangered Everglade snail kites to inform ecosystem restoration
dictors of nesting for snail kites in south Florida. The results of our modeling indicate that hydrology, percent canopy cover, and proximity to recently burned areas were the most important factors associated with nest-site selection for snail kites. Water depths between 75 and 100 cm, water recession rates between 0 and 1.25 cm/day, percent canopy coversAuthorsAllison Benscoter, Laura D'Acunto, Saira Haider, Robert J. Fletcher Jr., Stephanie RomanachSea level rise may pose conservation challenges for the endangered Cape Sable seaside sparrow
Biodiversity conservation under a changing climate is a challenging endeavor. Landscapes are shifting as a result of climate change and sea level rise but plant communities in particular may not keep up with the pace of change. Predictive ecological models can help decision makers understand how species are likely to respond to change and then adjust management actions to align with desired futureAuthorsStephanie Romanach, Saira Haider, Allison BenscoterManaging multiple species with conflicting needs in the Greater Everglades
Given limited funding, natural resources decision making is riddled with tradeoffs, including which species or landscapes to prioritize for management action. Florida’s Everglades wetland is home to numerous indicator species, some of which are endangered. But with a multitude of species comes differing hydrologic requirements to yield appropriate foraging and breeding conditions for each. The EveAuthorsStephanie Romanach, Saira Haider, Caitlin E. Hackett, Mark McKelvy, Leonard G. PearlstineLandscape-scale drivers of endangered Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow (Ammospiza maritima mirabilis) presence using an ensemble modeling approach
The Florida Everglades is a vast and iconic wetland ecosystem in the southern United States that has undergone dramatic changes from habitat degradation, development encroachment, and water impoundment. Starting in the past few decades, large restoration projects have been undertaken to restore the landscape, including improving conditions for threatened and imperiled taxa. One focus of restoratioAuthorsSaira Haider, Allison Benscoter, Leonard G. Pearlstine, Laura D'Acunto, Stephanie RomanachThe Everglades vulnerability analysis—Integrating ecological models and addressing uncertainty
The Everglades vulnerability analysis (EVA) is a project led by the U.S. Geological Survey in cooperation with the National Park Service and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to accomplish one of the science goals of Restoration Coordination & Verification (RECOVER), a multiagency group responsible for providing scientific and technical evaluations and assessments for improving the ability of the ComprAuthorsLaura E. D’Acunto, Stephanie S. Romañach, Saira M. Haider, Caitlin E. Hackett, Jennifer H. Nestler, Dilip Shinde, Leonard G. PearlstineKnowledge synthesis of Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow science
This report represents a literature review of science conducted on the Cape Sable Seaside Sparrow (Ammospiza maritima mirabilis, hereafter “CSSS” or “spar-row”). This information can be used as a foundation for the upcoming Species Status Assessment and for updating the CSSS Recovery Plan. This report focuses on areas of interest relative to CSSS management such as habitat, hydrology, fire, and poAuthorsAllison Benscoter, Saira Haider, Kelly G. Guilbeau, Stephanie RomanachEverForecast—A near-term forecasting application for ecological decision support
The Everglades Forecasting application (EverForecast) provides decision makers with a support tool to examine optimal allocations of water across the managed landscape while explicitly quantifying the conflicting needs of multiple species. Covering the Greater Everglades (a vast, subtropical wetland ecosystem in South Florida), EverForecast provides 6-month forecasts of daily projected water stageAuthorsSaira M. Haider, Stephanie S. Romañach, Mark McKelvy, Kevin J. Suir, Leonard PearlstineThe Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN) surface-water interpolation model, version 3
The Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN) is an integrated network of water-level gages, interpolation models that estimate daily water-level data at ungaged locations, and applications that generate derived hydrologic data across the freshwater part of the Greater Everglades landscape. Version 3 (V3) of the EDEN interpolation surface-water model is the most recent update, replacing the versiAuthorsSaira Haider, Eric Swain, James Beerens, Matthew D. Petkewich, Bryan McCloskey, Heather HenkelNear-term spatial hydrologic forecasting in Everglades, USA for landscape planning and ecological forecasting
Operational ecological forecasting is an emerging field that leverages ecological models in a new, cross-disciplinary way – using a real-time or nearly real-time climate forecast to project near-term ecosystem states. These applications give decision-makers lead time to anticipate and manage state changes that degrade ecosystem functions or directly impact humans. The Everglades Forecasting modelAuthorsLeonard G. Pearlstine, James M. Beerens, Gregg Reynolds, Saira Haider, Mark McKelvy, Kevin Suir, Stephanie Romanach, Jennifer H. NestlerPotential impacts of future urbanization and sea level rise on Florida’s natural resources
As urban development continues to encroach into natural systems, these ecosystems experience increasing degradation to their form and function. Losses in biodiversity and ecosystem function are further compounded by changing climatic conditions. The State of Florida is known for its biodiversity but has experienced declines in species populations and habitats because of urbanization and sea levelAuthorsStephanie Romanach, Allison Benscoter, Saira HaiderManaging conflicts in the River of Grass
Chances are, you would not pack up and move to a new home without first researching the neighborhood, reviewing your finances, and maybe investigating schools nearby. Similarly, you would not buy the first car you find on a magazine cover without first reviewing the technical specifications, exploring your options, and perhaps taking a test drive. Even when making simple purchases online, you probAuthorsStephanie S. Romañach, James M. Beerens, Larry Perez, Saira Haider, Leonard G. Pearlstine - Software
Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM) NetCDF R Package
R-language code library to support netCDF I/O. This package was written to ease the process of reading and writing netcdfs in R for the Joint Ecosystem Modeling (JEM; https://jem.gov/) community. NetCDF files created using this package follow the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) data standards to facilitate data sharing among scientists in the Everglades area.EDEN: Everglades Depth Estimation Network Water Level And Depth Surfaces
An R package that provides a set of functions for the Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN). EDEN is an integrated network of water-level gages, interpolation models that estimate daily water-level data at ungaged locations, and applications that generate derived hydrologic data across the freshwater part of the Greater Everglades landscape. This package contains the scripts that run the inteEDEN
This package provides a set of functions for the Everglades Depth Estimation Network (EDEN).