Agricultural development is a leading cause of habitat destruction that increasingly threatens global biodiversity. To help understand the likelihood and implications of agricultural expansion in areas of high conservation importance, this article examines agricultural suitability in forested portions of biodiversity hotspots and tropical wilderness areas, regions with especially rich concentra...

In Nepal, the red panda (Ailurus fulgens) has been sparsely studied, although its range covers a wide area. The present study was carried out in the previously untapped Chitwan-Annapurna Landscape (CHAL) situated in central Nepal with an aim to explore current distributional status and identify key habitat use. Extensive field surveys conducted in 10 red panda range districts were used to estim...

To conserve habitat for disturbance specialist species, ecologists must identify where individuals will likely settle in newly disturbed areas. Habitat suitability models can predict which sites at new disturbances will most likely attract specialists. Without validation data from newly disturbed areas, however, the best approach for maximizing predictive accuracy can be unclear (Northwestern U...

Species distribution and endangerment can be assessed by habitat-suitability modelling. This study addresses methodical aspects of habitat suitability modelling and includes an application example in actual species conservation and landscape planning. Models using species presence-absence data are preferable to presence-only models. In contrast to species presence data, absences are rarely reco...

BACKGROUND Accurate predictions of species distributions are essential for climate change impact assessments. However the standard practice of using long-term climate averages to train species distribution models might mute important temporal patterns of species distribution. The benefit of using temporally explicit weather and distribution data has not been assessed. We hypothesized that short...

This paper explores the effects of spatial resolution on the performance and applicability of habitat models in wildlife management and conservation. A Habitat Suitability Index (HSI) model for the Capercaillie (Tetrao urogallus) in the Bavarian Alps, Germany, is presented. The model was exclusively built on non-spatial, small-scale variables of forest structure and without any consideration of...

Abstract Land use change and intensification are the most important direct drivers of decreasing biodiversity globally. Therefore, European Union created Natura 2000 network to protect endangered species habitats. Here we interested how ambitious goals actually implemented studying a habitat, “Sarmatic steppe pine forests” (Code 91U0) in national hotspot Franconia (Germany). These forests relic...