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Prioritizing conservation seed banking locations for imperiled hemlock species using multi-attribute frontier mapping

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Abstract

Hemlock woolly adelgid (Adelges tsugae Annand) (HWA) is an invasive forest insect sweeping across the native range of eastern (Tsuga canadensis [L.] Carr.) and Carolina (Tsuga caroliniana Engelm.) hemlocks, threatening to severely reduce eastern hemlock extent and to push Carolina hemlock to extirpation. HWA poses a significant threat to these eastern US natives, now infesting hemlocks across 19 states and more than 400 counties. For the long-term preservation of the species, ex situ genetic resource conservation efforts such as seed collection, storage, and adelgid-resistant hemlock breeding may all be necessary. To ensure the efficient and effective application of these efforts, it will be necessary to prioritize locations within the native ranges, because it is logistically impossible to apply these efforts to all populations. To build upon 12 years of seed banking for eastern and Carolina hemlock, we applied a novel approach for incorporating multiple dissimilar data sets into a geographic prioritization of areas for the most effective and efficient conservation of genetic diversity. The approach involves integration of geographic information systems with the multi-attribute frontier mapping technique to identify locations across the ranges of these two imperiled species most in need of conservation actions. Specifically, our assessment incorporated four genetic diversity parameters, a climate component, a measure of population disjunctiveness, a measure of local hemlock abundance, and seed collection density to prioritize areas of eastern and Carolina hemlock occurrence for ex situ gene conservation. For each species, the result was a mapped index of locations prioritized by the combined significance of these factors. For eastern hemlock, this assessment assigned the highest priority to disjunct populations and to some areas within the main-body range. With Carolina hemlock, disjunct northern populations and central main-body locations received the highest prioritization. Our prioritization approach could be applied similarly to other species facing pressure from invasive pests or other environmental threats.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Heather Dinon Aldridge and Corey Davis at the Southeast Climate Science Center for their support with the climate datasets and their proper implementation. This work was supported in part by the Pine Integrated Network: Education, Mitigation, and Adaptation Project (PINEMAP) funded by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Award #2011-68002-30185. This work was also supported through Research Joint Venture Agreement 13-JV-11330110-072 between the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Southern Research Station, and North Carolina State University and Grant Agreements 11-DG-11083150-011 and 12-DG-11083150-016 between the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Forest Health Protection and Camcore, North Carolina State University.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. NSF Center for Integrated Pest Management, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 7553, Raleigh, NC, 27606, USA

    John M. Hastings

  2. Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources, North Carolina State University, 3041 Cornwallis Road, Research Triangle Park, NC, 27709, USA

    Kevin M. Potter

  3. Eastern Forest Environmental Threat Assessment Center, Southern Research Station, United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service, 3041 Cornwallis Road, Research Triangle Park, NC, 27709, USA

    Frank H. Koch

  4. Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 8008, Raleigh, NC, 27695, USA

    Mark Megalos

  5. Camcore, Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 8008, Raleigh, NC, 27695, USA

    Robert M. Jetton

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Correspondence to Robert M. Jetton.

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Hastings, J.M., Potter, K.M., Koch, F.H. et al. Prioritizing conservation seed banking locations for imperiled hemlock species using multi-attribute frontier mapping. New Forests 48, 301–316 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11056-017-9575-7

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