Date of Report: 24 May 1999

Date of Next Status Report: 30 June 2000

Date of Workprogram Approval:

Project Completion Date: 30 June 2001

LCMR Work Program 1999

I. PROJECT TITLE: Predicting Water and Forest Resources Health and Sustainability

Project Manager: JoAnn M. Hanowski

Affiliation: Natural Resources Research Institute

Mailing Address: 5013 Miller Trunk Highway, Duluth, MN 55811

Web Page Address: http://www.nrri.umn.edu/SUSTAIN/

Total Biennial Project Budget:

________________________

A. Legal Citation: ML 1999, [Chap. 231], Sec. [16], Subd. [12]. Benchmark and Indicators

Predicting Water and Forest Resources Health and Sustainability

Appropriation Language: Predicting Water and Forest Resources Health and Sustainability $150,000 the first year and $150,000 the second year are from the trust fund to the University of Minnesota, Natural Resources Research Institute, to assess ecosystem health using indicators to develop models that incorporate landscape composition change.

B. Status of Match Requirement: No match required.

II. PROJECT SUMMARY AND RESULTS:

Our objective is to compile existing or create new indicators of biodiversity, soil productivity and water quality and to incorporate these metrics into a decision support model that will predict forest and aquatic ecosystem health and sustainability under a variety of management scenarios. Ecosystem health will be quantified by an index and this index compared to a range of indices calculated for the historical condition of the landscape undergoing a natural disturbance regime. Using existing databases on forest birds, amphibians, aquatic insects and ecosystem conditions, we propose to integrate tools such as geographic information systems (GIS), satellite image analysis, multivariate statistical methods, and simulation models to create this management tool. Project investigators are currently documenting changes in terrestrial and aquatic species resulting from forest and agricultural management practices in several regions of Minnesota, therefore large data sets on birds and aquatic insects are on-hand. Other databases will be acquired and used in indicator development. Relevant GIS data layers also have been developed or acquired for Minnesota, including forest cover classification, elevation, hydrography, soils, surficial geology and wetland classification. Together the environmental and organismal data will be used to test existing indicators and develop new indicators where necessary. Specific objectives are to: 1) identify and compile existing data for specific biota in three regions of Minnesota; 2) develop metrics to measure ecosystem condition at different scales; 3) evaluate the effects of land use changes on these metrics for a variety of management scenarios and 4) develop a workable decision making system that can be used by a variety of land planning agencies, industrial groups, and private citizens.

III. PROGRESS SUMMARY:

IV. OUTLINE OF PROJECT RESULTS:

Completion Date: 30 January 2000

Completion Date: 30 September 2000

Completion Date: 30 December 2000

Completion Date: 30 June 2001

Completion Date: 30 June 2001

V. DISSEMINATION: Information gathered in this project will be presented to a variety of audiences including both public and private land use planners and the scientific community. The final product, a decision making model will be made available in a usable format to the public. Information will also be available as a page on the Natural Resources Research Institute Web site http://www.nrri.umn.edu/SUSTAIN/.

VI. CONTEXT

A. Significance: Minnesota’s forest and water resources are important contributors to the well-being of citizens located throughout the state. Maintaining these vital resources is a common goal among Minnesota’s public because they provide a wide variety of benefits that contribute to the economy, local community and the natural environment. Measuring current, and predicting future forest and water resource health and sustainability is difficult because they are influenced by many factors (e.g., climate, land use change, land management practices, soil type, natural disturbances) and complex interactions among these factors. In addition, coordinated planning for multiple uses of these resources including resource management, tourism and recreation is difficult due to the existence of multiple regulatory bodies, existing land ownership patterns, and the inherent complexity of these ecosystems. Decisions regarding management of these systems is difficult because all of these factors need to be considered simultaneously. This situation mandates a need to develop novel approaches to assess current, and to predict future conditions in the economy, community and natural environment under different management regimes.

We can begin to understand this complex picture by identifying the role that each factor has and the scale on which they impact water and forest resource sustainability. Some of this information exists for Minnesota including a multiscale ecological classification of Minnesota (Ecological Classification System). Additional technological developments including geographic information systems (GIS), multivariate statistical methods, and spatially-explicit simulation models provide analytical capabilities not previously available. Basic research on animal species has provided important information on distribution of these species, their response to environmental stress, and their relationship to landscape features. Therefore, this combination of spatial databases, statistical methods, and biotic databases provides the potential to develop predictive models and decision making tools for assessing the response of organisms to a variety of management strategies and a method for measuring water and forest resource health.

Information for measuring forest and water resource health can be obtained directly by conducting a large number of individual measurements (a time-consuming and expensive procedure), or we can select a few important factors that have been shown to indicate ecosystem health. A large body of work has already been undertaken to quantify the response of sentinel organisms such as birds, amphibians and aquatic insects to a range of environmental conditions. Birds are key biological indicators of the health and stability of forest ecosystems and are relatively easy to study because their ecology is well known. Breeding birds also represent 60 to 70% of the terrestrial species biological diversity in Minnesota’s forests and the highest species richness in North America occurs in Minnesota. Current knowledge indicates that birds have a strong link to the forest economy due to their insectivorous habits and declines in numbers would result in a reduction in forest productivity. Because amphibians use both land and water resources, information on this group will provide the crucial link between water and forest systems. The use of benthic invertebrates for environmental monitoring also has long history due to their reliability and effectiveness as environmental indicators. They are an integral part of riverine systems and play a large role in detrital processing, nutrient cycling and are also a food source for higher trophic levels such as fish and birds. Macroinvertebrates are being used by resource managers in environmental monitoring and as indicators of local scale site conditions.

Investigators in this study have already gathered a large data set on birds and aquatic insects in several Minnesota watersheds and are currently documenting changes in terrestrial and aquatic species due to a variety of forest and agricultural management practices. The proposed work will complement these efforts by adding species group information where it is currently lacking. In addition, several GIS data layers have been developed for Minnesota including forest cover classification, elevation, hydrography, soils, surficial geology and wetland classification. Using both existing and newly collected data, we propose to integrate tools such as geographic information systems, satellite image analysis, multivariate statistical methods, and simulation models to predict forest ecosystem health and sustainability using forest birds, amphibians and aquatic insects.

B: Time: All objectives will be completed during the 1999-2001 biennium.

C: Budget Context: Researchers at the Natural Resources Research Institute have already gathered much of the information that will contribute to the database developed and used in this project. These include (but are not limited to the following: 1) Minnesota Forest Resources Council $120,000: Some baseline data on birds and aquatic insects as well as GIS information have been gathered for three watersheds in northern Minnesota. 2) Environmental Protection Agency $925,000: A project to develop aquatic macroinvertebrate indicator species models including work in the proposed site in SE Minnesota. 3) Minnesota Forest Bird Diversity Initiative $1,200,000: GIS forest cover data for the forested area of Minnesota and landscape models for breeding birds; 4) United States Forest Service $300,000: Trend and habitat information for breeding birds in the Chippewa and Superior National Forests, and $25,000: Effect of wetlands and forest harvest on stream insects. 5) Minnesota Sea Grant $94,828. 6) Lake Superior Decision Support Systems, $515,000: Development of detailed GIS databases and decision support tools for the Lake Superior Basin. 7) USFS Great Lakes Assessment $100,000: Development and data visualization and decision support tools for Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan.

We have developed a good working relationship with several forest product companies and Counties in northern Minnesota over the past 10 years. The companies and Counties have cooperated with us on several projects by: 1) providing property to conduct studies, 2) conducting forest experimental manipulations on these study areas, and 3) assigning representative foresters and biologists to participate in design and implementation of experiments. For this project, all three of the major pulp and paper companies in northern Minnesota (Boise Cascade, Blandin-UPM and Potlatch) will cooperate on this project. Lake County is also participating on this project. The value of the cooperators in-kind investment in this project is about $30,000 each or a total of $120,000. This represents costs for land-use, forest inventory and other data, and staff time. Cooperators will also be part of a steering committee that will provide input to the investigators during all stages of the project. In addition, a subset of the cooperators will test the model during the development process.

The $300,000 allocation from LCMR will used to compile and analyze existing biotic data that to develop indicators to assess forest and water resources health and sustainability. This information will be applied to develop a decision support program that can be used by resource planners across the State.

BUDGET:

2. Budget detail (see Attachment A)

VII. COOPERATION:

VIII: LOCATION: Lake, St. Louis, Itasca, Cass, Carlton, Rice, Dakota, Goodhue, LeSueur Counties

IX: Reporting Requirements: Periodic work program progress reports will be submitted not later than June 2000 and March 2001. A final work program report and associated products will be submitted by June 30, 2001.

X. Research projects. See addendum

Attachment A. Deliverable products and related budget.