Quantifying taxon-specific habitat connectivity requirements of urban wildlife using structured expert judgement

• DOI: 10.32942/x2k32p
• Publication Date: 2024-02-28T16:04:33Z
• Authors: Steph Courtney Jones; Luke O'Loughlin; Danswell Starrs; Jacinta Humphrey; Stephanie Pulsford; Hugh Allan; Matthew Beitzel; Kym Birgan; Suzi Bond; Jenny Bounds; Deborah Bower; Renee Brawata; Ben Broadhurst; Emma Carlson; Simon Clulow; Saul Cunningham; Luke Dunn; Lisa Evans; Bruno Ferronato; Don Fletcher; Arthur Georges; Amy-Marie Gilpin; Mark Hall; Brian Hawkins; Anke Maria Hoefer; Brett Howland; Damian Lettoof; Mark Lintermans; Michelle Littlefair; Tanya Latty; Tyrone Lavery; Zohara Lucas; George Madani; Kim Maute; Richard Milner; Eric Nordberg; Thea O'Loughlin; Woo O'Reilly; Megan O'Shea; Laura Rayner; Euan G. Ritchie; Natasha Robinson; Stephen Sarre; Manu Saunders; Benjamin Scheele; Julian Seddon; Rob Speirs; Ricky Spencer; Ingrid Stirnemann; David Watson; Belinda Wilson; Peter Unmack; Yuying Zhao; Melissa Snape
• Keywords: Wildlife corridor

Urban planning which enhances native biodiversity in and around cities is needed to address the impacts of urbanisation conserve urban biodiversity. The “Biodiversity Sensitive Design” (BSUD) framework incorporates ecological knowledge into achieve positive outcomes through improved design infrastructure development. BSUD includes principles direct strategic placement connected wildlife habitat. However, effective implementation requires defining quantifying landscape-scale habitat connectivity needs a range taxon groups within contexts. aim our study was use expert elicitation these gaps currently limiting capacity planning. We estimated for seven representative environments, including ideal habitat, constraints, barriers movement, movement thresholds that determine connectivity. In using quantify requirements biodiversity, provides insights on both usefulness inform generally, functional focal specifically. Overall, we consider expert-derived estimates be highly useful set baseline data modelling groups.