Connectivity

All of the different conservation planning goals that we have been talking about in this course, including responsiveness to climate change, representation and persistence can only be achieved if protected areas are functionally connected and embedded within their surrounding landscapes. So, this week are going to be looking at the role of connectivity in conservation.

Let's start by defining what we mean by connectivity, it's different components and how we can measure it:

Connectivity is important to consider in conservation planning efforts at all scales, and the general trend in the field has been to think about connectivity on larger and larger scales (like our reading by  Baldwin et al. (2018)  demonstrates). However, it is just as important to consider connectivity at more local level scales, and the best connectivity conservation plans are integrated across multiple scales.

The importance of connectivity in conservation is well understood and it has been included in a number of global conservation agreements and targets, including the Convention on Biological Diversity. In addition to its quantitative protected areas targets (17% terrestrial and inland waters and 10% coastal and marine area by 2020), Aichi Target 11 calls for the global protected areas system to be well connected. Although we have a clear picture of how well the protected area targets have been met, it is less clear as to whether the connectivity aspect has been met. Our reading by  Ward et al. (2020)  tried to get a better understanding of the current state of connectivity in the global protected areas system:

In order to maintain and restore ecological connectivity, especially between protected areas, a number of organizations and projects have been created to work on large scale connectivity.

One of first, and most ambitious, of these large scale corridor projects in North America is the  Yellowstone to Yukon (Y2Y) Conservation Initiative  (Y2Y). Y2Y is a not-for-profit organization that works towards maintaining and restoring habitat integrity and connectivity along the spine of the Rocky Mountains, aiming to connect landscapes from Yellowstone National Park to the Yukon Territory.

Y2Y was first established in 1993 and has since evolved into a partnership of more than 450 organizations, including conservation NGOs, Indigenous governments, ranching groups and scientists across the region. Y2Y's role is to set the context for regional conservation work in the area providing a vision of a connected, healthy landscape, and bringing together all of these partners to achieve far more than any one organization could on their own.

Since 1993, Y2Y has worked to increase the protected area in the region by more than 50%. To see their progress between over their first 20 years swipe between the two maps below:

So what does this progress look like on the ground? This video highlights some of the key achievements of the first two decades of Y2Y:

Y2Y, and other connectivity conservation initiatives like it, highlight the need to work across borders for biodiversity conservation. Let's dig a little deeper on the need to find collaborations across borders for biodiversity conservation and look at a few examples:

Roads are one of the biggest barriers to ecological connectivity and they create some of the biggest challenges to connectivity conservation. Let's look at the challenges of roads present and some of the ways they can be mitigated: