An internet-accessible knowledge system on spatial evaluation of the habitat of meadow birds

Effective management for nature conservation needs a basis in scientific research and a careful communication of the knowledge to the workers in the field. This is especially the case in agri-environmental schemes, where nature conservation is to be combined with agricultural production. The Netherlands form a vital part of the natural habitat of a well-known meadow bird, the black-tailed godwit (Limosa limosa). A large portion of the European population is breeding in the Netherlands, but numbers are declining rapidly. Therefore, farmers united in agricultural nature conservation groups formulate management schemes to manage their meadows in a mode which is beneficial for the black-tailed godwit. For meadow birds there is a long lasting discussion on this subject, with questions like: what are the minimum conditions which have to be fulfilled? What are the possibilities within agriculture and how does this relate to nature reserves? What area is needed to reach the pre-defined goals? The today’s view is that a so-called mosaic-management is needed, an alternation of several growth stages and type of use, in space and time. In practice there is a gap between scientists and workers in the field how an effective mosaic is defined. To bridge this gap, Alterra’s experts on meadow birds have used ArcGIS to develop a knowledge system. This knowledge system is a spatially explicit model to assess the effectiveness of management schemes in combination with a web-based user-interface which can be used by members of the agricultural nature conservation groups to enter management schemes. The data collected by this web-site are used as input for the ArcGIS model. The system concentrates on defining suitability of the habitat (excluding management) and on the expected effectivity of management, related tot the survival of chicks. With the exception of the ArcGIS model, the system could be transferred to organisations which do not have ArcGIS at their disposal. The application of open standards facilitates integration with other GIS software applied by those organizations. The system consists of a number of components. Representatives of the agricultural nature conservation groups are allowed to log in to the data entry application. This application has been developed using Adobe Flex. It connects to a transactional WFS (open standard describing read-write access to spatial data) to insert and update the information with regard to the management schemes. The open source internet GIS server GeoServer was used as WFS and was connected to a proprietary Oracle Spatial database. To run the proprietary ArcGIS model, data are downloaded from the GeoServer WFS in Shape file format. A direct link between ArcGIS and the rest of the system is not yet fully operational but will be in the near future. The approach as described above has been successful. The system has been used by agricultural nature conservation groups and has received positive feedback. It became also clear that there is a list of potential improvements. A follow-up on this will strongly improve the application and make it better suited to assist the users in applying management schemes which will be beneficial for the black-tailed godwit.