Description: This layer highlights Priority Wildlife Connectivity Areas in Oregon. Priority Wildlife Connectivity Areas (PWCAs) represent the parts of the landscape with the highest overall value for facilitating wildlife movement. This interconnected network of PWCAs was developed by extracting the top 1% of priority connectivity areas for all 54 OCAMP species and linking these areas using an optimal network analysis, with an emphasis on high-priority areas (i.e., the top 2% of priority areas were preferred over the top 3%, which were preferred over the top 4%, etc.) as well as climate refugia and permanent streams/riparian climate corridors. Habitat not included in PWCAs may still represent quality wildlife habitat, and may still have value for wildlife connectivity. PWCAs were not delineated within GAP Status 1 lands (Designated Wilderness Areas and Crater Lake National Park).Each 40-acre hexagon is attributed with information on PWCA type, land management, and Primary and Secondary Recommended Conservation Actions. PWCA Types:Regions were delineated from the combined top 1% of priorities across all 54 surrogate species selected for the connectivity analysis. Regions are large, contiguous areas and represent the highest-value habitat for facilitating species movement throughout the state.Connectors follow the optimal pathways between Regions. Connectors represent the best available habitat for facilitating movement from Region to Region. Connectors may pass through high-quality habitat in intact, relatively undisturbed parts of the landscape, as well as the best remaining marginal habitat in developed or degraded areas.Steppingstones are individual or small groups of isolated hexagons within urban growth boundaries. Steppingstones represent remnant areas of intact habitat within otherwise developed landscapes that may help facilitate wildlife movement through urban areas.There are four broad categories of Recommended Conservation Action: Protect, Restore, Transportation Mitigation, and Enhance/Maintain. Protect: All hexagons within the PWCA network would benefit from protection measures, but those hexagons specifically attributed with a Recommended Conservation Action of ‘Protect’ have been targeted for their value for facilitating wildlife movement. These hexagons represent both the highest-quality habitat available to facilitate movement, as well as bottlenecked areas of movement that risk loss of connectivity if land conversion were to occur. Hexagons attributed as ‘Protect’ would benefit from targeted measures to protect and preserve habitat, including land acquisition, execution of conservation easements, or specific habitat designation within policy. Some hexagons attributed as ‘Protect’ fall within public or other lands that are already under some level of protection from development. For these areas, efforts to ‘Protect’ habitat to benefit wildlife connectivity may benefit from specific management actions, such as road closures, area closures, or other forms of recreation management, removal or modification of grazing leases, avoidance of habitat loss or disturbance from resource extraction activities such as logging or mining, and/or habitat modifications to reduce wildfire risk and remove invasive species.Restore: As with the category for ‘Protect’, nearly all of the hexagons within the PWCA network would benefit from some level of habitat restoration or enhancement. Those hexagons attributed with a Recommended Conservation Action of ‘Restore’, however, are those that have significant overlap with development, agriculture, and/or mapped areas of invasive vegetation. These hexagons in particular would benefit from measures to rehabilitate habitat damaged by human impacts, including actions to remove and prevent reestablishment of invasive species, remove or modify barriers to wildlife movement, and promote native ecological communities.Transportation Mitigation: Any location the PWCA network intersects with a roadway is a potential site for transportation mitigation. However, some roads pose a greater risk to wildlife connectivity than others, based on road width/number of lanes, traffic volumes, traffic speed, driver sightlines, and proximity to higher-quality habitats. Hexagons attributed with a Recommended Conservation Action of ‘Transportation Mitigation’ are areas of the PWCA network that are particularly susceptible to fragmentation from roadways, as determined both by the value of the surrounding habitat for facilitating movement, as well as known areas of high densities of wildlife-vehicle collisions. Areas designated as being in need of Transportation Mitigation would benefit from installation of wildlife crossing structures or autonomous animal detection systems that would improve wildlife passage across the road.Enhance/Maintain: Some areas within the PWCA network are at a lower risk of habitat loss due to conversion, represent quality, but not necessarily the highest priority of, habitat available for facilitating wildlife movement, and have limited overlap with development, agriculture, or invasive vegetation. These hexagons have been attributed with a Recommended Conservation Action of ‘Enhance/Maintain’. As with the other hexagons in the network, these areas would benefit from protection measures, but specific actions associated with hexagons attributed as ‘Enhance/Maintain’ could include maintenance of existing conditions that are already favorable to an assemblage of species, avoidance or minimization of adverse impacts that would fragment habitat, removal, modification, or avoidance of the installation of barriers to wildlife movement, and minor habitat enhancements to ensure continued functionality, including prevention of the establishment of invasive species, wildfire risk minimization, and recreation management.
Copyright Text: Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, 2023