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ForestERA Metadata - Mexican Spotted Owl Management Guidelines

Abstract

This is a layer representing the extent of land on the western Mogollon Plateau that is predicted to fall under the legal guidance of the Mexican Spotted Owl (Strix occidentalis lucida) management guidelines. The layer was built using ForestERA vegetation layers and the definitions of Mexican Spotted Owl habitat outlined in the management guidelines for that species (published by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service in 1995). The layer has a resolution of 90m (0.8 ha or 2 acres).

Purpose

This data layer was created as part of the ForestERA project to support landscape-scale forest restoration planning efforts by a broad group of stakeholders including federal and state agencies, academic institutions, and non-governmental entities. The layer was specifically created at the request of the USDA Forest Service and other federal agencies that have a legal mandate to manage according to the guidelines.

Supplementary Information

This layer was developed using the ForestERA dominant overstory vegetation layer, a slope layer derived from a United States Geological Survey digital elevation model (DEM), a layer depicting specially designated protected areas (roadless areas, wilderness areas, and national parks and monuments ) obtained from the Arizona Land Resource Information System (ALRIS), and a layer identifying designated Mexican Spotted Owl Protected Activity Centers (PACs) obtained from the United States Forest Service.

The layer is a prediction of the extent of the landscape that falls under the legal guidelines for management of Mexican Spotted Owl habitat. Habitat areas are defined as being either “protected habitat”, or “restricted habitat”. The legal management guidelines for each of these designations are outlined in the official management guidelines document. Protected habitat includes Mexican Spotted Owl PACs, areas of mixed-conifer or pine-oak vegetation on slopes greater than 40%, and areas of mixed-conifer or pine-oak vegetation in specially designated protected areas. Restricted habitat includes all other areas of mixed-conifer and pine-oak habitat. We were unable to obtain data layers that identified past management actions or tree size. Thus, areas that had been logged in the past 20 years, and areas that did not contain enough large trees were not eliminated from the habitat designations.

Two additional rules were used to clean the map. First areas identified as mixed-conifer in the ForestERA vegetation map, but occurring above 9500 ft, were eliminated. These areas are actually covered by spruce-fir vegetation, which is not included in the management guidelines. There is very little spruce-fir on the western Mogollon Plateau, and so the ForestERA layer does not distinguish spruce-fir from other mixed-conifer. Seconsly, any isolated patches of habitat that covered less than 20 acres were eliminated, as these areas were considered too small to fall under the management guidelines.

These data are intended for regional analyses over spatial extents on the order of tens to hundreds of thousands of acres, and were not developed for use at finer spatial scales, although they may be useful for some applications at those finer scales.

Status of the data

Complete
Data update frequency: None planned

Time period for which the data is relevant

Date and time: 2000
Description:
publication date

Publication Information

Who created the data: Forest Ecosystem Restoration Analysis Project
Date and time: February 1, 2005.

Data storage and access information

File name: msoguide90m
Type of data: raster digital data

Location of the data:
\\ENVSCI41\Shared\metadata_layers\grids\msoguide90m
Data processing environment: Microsoft Windows 2000 Version 5.0 (Build 2195)
Service Pack 4; ESRI ArcCatalog 8.1.2.671

Accessing the data

Size of the data: 11.172 MB
Data transfer size: 11.172 MB

Constraints on accessing and using the data

Access constraints: This layer may be accessed by any interested party. It is
provided by the Forest Ecosystem Restoration Analysis project, the Ecological
Restoration Institute (ERI), and Northern Arizona University (NAU).

Use constraints: This layer is provided for public use by the ForestERA project, ERI, and NAU. Reports, presentations, and publications in which this layer is presented or
used for analytical purposes should acknowledge the ForestERA project.

Details about this document

Contents last updated: 20040421 at time 14425800

Who completed this document

Forest Ecosystem Restoration Analysis Project
Center For Environmental Sciences and Education:
Northern Arizona University
Flagstaff, Arizona 86011-5694
United States
928-523-0068 (voice)
928-523-7423 (fax)

Contact Instructions

Contact Dr. Thomas D. Sisk or the Forest Ecosystem Restoraton Analysis Project.

Standards used to create this document

Standard name: FGDC Content Standards for Digital Geospatial Metadata
Standard version: FGDC-STD-001-1998
Time convention used in this document: local time
Metadata profiles defining additonal information
ESRI Metadata Profile: http://www.esri.com/metadata/esriprof80.html

Horizontal coordinate system

Projected coordinate system name: NAD_1983_UTM_Zone_12N
Geographic coordinate system name: GCS_North_American_1983
Details
Grid Coordinate System Name: Universal Transverse Mercator
UTM Zone Number: 12
Transverse Mercator Projection
Scale Factor at Central Meridian: 0.999600
Longitude of Central Meridian: -111.000000
Latitude of Projection Origin: 0.000000
False Easting: 500000.000000
False Northing: 0.000000

Planar Coordinate Information

Planar Distance Units: meters
Coordinate Encoding Method: row and column
Coordinate Representation
Abscissa Resolution: 90.000000
Ordinate Resolution: 90.000000

Geodetic Model

Horizontal Datum Name: North American Datum of 1983
Ellipsoid Name: Geodetic Reference System 80
Semi-major Axis: 6378137.000000
Denominator of Flattening Ratio: 298.257222

Bounding coordinates

Horizontal
In decimal degrees
West: -113.044931
East: -109.878536
North: 35.587479
South: 34.107751
In projected or local coordinates
Left: 314687.387285
Right: 601607.387285
Top: 3938195.572581
Bottom: 3775925.572581

Spatial data description

Raster dataset information
Raster format: ESRI GRID
SDTS raster type: Grid Cell
Number of raster bands: 1
Raster properties
Origin location: Upper Left
Has pyramids: FALSE
Has colormap: FALSE
Data compression type: Default
Display type: matrix values
Cell information
Number of cells on x-axis: 3188
Number of cells on y-axis: 1803
Number of cells on z-axis: 1
Number of bits per cell: 32
Cell Size
X distance: 90.000000
Y distance: 90.000000
No detailed attribute information is available.