Conservation inherently concerns space and geography. Space, because usually we have to determine the area needed to conserve a species, community or ecosystem. Geography, because the location of a biodiversity target relative to a critical resource or threat frequently affects long-term conservation outcomes. Geospatial analysis tools, including satellite imagery, computer-based modeling, and mapping systems such as GIS, have radically transformed our ability to study the spatial ecology and conservation geographies of species, communities and ecosystems. These geospatial technologies allow us to detect, delineate, and monitor natural biological systems. New advances in spatial ecology permit us to consider these data in the context of our ecological understanding and to generalize these patterns to advance ecological theories and their applications. Taken together these disciplines and techniques give conservation biologists and practitioners a powerful toolbox.
This course provides a comprehensive overview of these disciplines and tools and includes hand-on tutorials ranging from land cover mapping and home range analysis to modeling of habitat selection and mapping species distributions. The course is focused on addressing conservation research problems using the GIS toolbox. Participants will learn to use commercially available software such as ArcMap, ArcMap Spatial Analyst, ERDAS Imagine, as well as selected open-source GIS tools such as QGIS, Geospatial Modelling Environment (GME), and R.
