December

Habitat Suitability Modeling for Bald Eagle Nesting Sites in the Thousand Islands Ecosystem

Organization
Parks Canada Agency, St. Lawrence Islands National Park of Canada

Author
Greg Saunders

ESRI Software
ArcGIS Desktop 8.3, ArcView 3.2, Spatial Analyst

Data Sources
Ministry of Natural Resources, St. Lawrence Islands National Park.

Description
Bald Eagle Haliaeetus leucocephalus habitat modeling in the Thousand Islands may assist the bi-national Lake Ontario Lakewide Management Plan (LaMP) to identify and protect remaining suitable Bald Eagle nesting habitat in the Lake Ontario Basin and upper St. Lawrence River region. This first draft predictive model uses local nesting habitat criteria and Model Builder's arithmetic overlay process to rate positive nesting habitat criteria (distance from food sources and forests) and negative nesting habitat criteria (distances from roads and builtup areas) against each other to produce a nesting habitat suitability map. Maps such as this can be used by researchers to ground truth high probability habitat and work with local landowners to achieve goals of the plan, which may include the construction of artificial nesting platforms.

Acknowledgements
R.A. (Bud) Andress, St. Lawrence Islands National Park of Canada; Leila Veenstra, Carleton University