Mapping species distributions using a rule based model and detailed landscape GIS.

Dr. Mark Mulligan, Dr. Nick Drake, Department of Geography, King's College London

Joe Tohme, CIAT, Cali, Colombia, (to be confirmed), Colombian taxonomist (to be identified)

This project aims to integrate biological and landscape research to identify rules for the occurrence of particular biological groups with respect to landscape variables of the HERB GIS model. These variables include soil type, geology, climate, landscape position, forest type and hydrological regime.

The rules for species occurrence will be developed on the basis of large sample monitoring of species occurrence (and non-occurrence) and relationships between species occurrence and the landscape properties discussed. The biological groups will be chosen on the basis of their ease of observation and the speciality of their environmental requirements.

Once multivariate correlations between occurrence and landscape properties have been developed, they will be used to develop the rule base for the biological group. Rules will be of a number of forms including:

  1. Distance X from feature Y e.g. 20 m from a river,
  2. Requires the presence of feature X,
  3. Requires the absence of feature X,
  4. Requires the combination of features X,Y,Z in magnitudes 1,2,3,
  5. Any combination of these.

These rule bases will then be used to identify all those areas within the HERB region (14 000 km2) that can support the biological group of interest, thereby producing a rapid regional assessment of species distribution. The technique will be validated by searching a random sample of the model defined areas of predicted occurrence for measured occurrence on the ground. Also a sample of those areas which the model states cannot support the species will be examined for species occurrence.

The success of this approach for different groups will be evaluated and the technique used to overlay the expected distribution of various related and unrelated species and biological groups, building up a picture of regional biodiversity

This project represents the second core biodiversity project for the HERB project.

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© 1996 Department of Geography, King's College London