Integrating Climate Change into State Wildlife Action Plans

Often described as "comprehensive wildlife conservation strategies", State Wildlife Action Plans are vital management planning documents that are currently undergoing ten-year revisions in fourteen northeastern states. To help states integrate climate change into their SWAPs,  NE CASC led the development of a regional synthesis to address unique threats to Regional Species of Greatest Conservation Need (RSGCN). This talk will present key findings from the four main areas of the synthesis: 1) regional and state-specific climate change projections for a range of climate variables (e.g., air temperature, precipitation, evapotranspiration, soil moisture, sea level rise); 2) existing regional Climate Change Vulnerability Assessments (CCVAs); 3) biological responses to climate impacts with a focus on Regional Species of Greatest Conservation Need (RSGCN); and 4) a range of adaptation strategies and actions available to natural resource agencies to conserve wildlife and ecosystems over the short and long term. The speakers will also discuss lessons learned when working with state partners to develop an actionable resource.  

Hanusia Higgins is a PhD student at the University of Georgia and a former NE CASC ORISE Fellow. She previously earned her M.S. from the University of Vermont studying the impacts of management responses to the invasive emerald ash borer on New England hardwood forests. 

Ambarish Karmalkar is an Assistant Professor of Geosciences at the University of Rhode Island. He was previously a faculty member at UMass Amherst, where he was also an NE CASC Research Fellow.  His research investigates regional and global climate variability and change, and evaluates the uncertainty in climate modeling and projections.