Oak Prairie Working Group Oak Prioritization Mapping

The Intertwine Alliance Oak Prairie Working Group (OPWG), a partnership of more than 30 agency, nonprofit, and community groups, completed a working Strategic Action Plan (SAP) to guide our conservation outcomes for imperiled Oregon white oak ecosystems. The SAP outlines actions for advancing spatial data, land conservation, active stewardship, knowledge, and community education, engagement, and advocacy around oak and prairie conservation. This talk outlines the work that the Oak Prairie Working Group is doing with Biohabitats, Inc. to create a spatial prioritization of oak conservation opportunities across the Regional Conservation Strategy planning area (RCS). Identifying high value conservation opportunities in both rural and urban landscapes, and prioritizing those opportunities, is needed to inform investments in land protection, restoration, and education and outreach. Our process includes overlaying mapped oak trees with landcover data and identifying and scoring the presence of oak at two different spatial configurations while also accounting for connectivity between high value habitat cores. Habitat patches are scored separately in rural areas than in urban areas to allow for the variability in habitat quality among these different landscapes and to ensure that corridors and connectivity across the urban matrix is included