Whither the Rangeland?: Protection and Conversion in California's Rangeland Ecosystems
Figure 2
Sequence of core spatial analyses used in study.
The three primary elements of the analysis are shown in sequence. The “change detection” step provided the full set of areas to classify in the “conversion classification.” Some lands where a change was detected but were not actually converted were removed from the analysis as false conversions. Converted lands were removed from the habitat data for the “status assessment”, which quantified the proportion of habitats under various types of protection. The year of the data used in FMMP overlays between time point 1 and time point 2 varied by survey area. Nineteen of the thirty-six survey areas spanned the period from 1984–2008, five spanned the period 1984–2006; and the remaining twelve covered various years with an average of seventeen years across them. The most protective conservation management status was assigned to land if multiple statuses existed, in order of precedence: fee ownership, easement, Williamson Act enrollment.