User Manual for Range Tool for Article 12 (Birds Directive) & Article 17 (Habitats Directive)

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Philip Phelps
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1 EUROPEAN TOPIC CENTRE ON BIOLOGICAL DIVERSITY User Manual for Range Tool for Article 12 (Birds Directive) & Article 17 (Habitats Directive) Prepared by Brian Mac Sharry (MNHN) Version 1.1 Date: 30 th of May 2012 The European Topic Centre on Biological Diversity (ETC/BD) is a consortium of nine organisations under a Framework Partnership Agreement with the European Environment Agency AOPK CR ECNC EPASA ILE SAS ISPRA JNCC MNHN SLU UBA V

The ETC/BD & EEA have, through an external contractor (TeamNET in Romania), created a tool for the creation of range maps based on the discussion in the explanatory notes and guidelines and

2 The ETC/BD & EEA have, through an external contractor (TeamNET in Romania), created a tool for the creation of range maps based on the discussion in the explanatory notes and guidelines and associated discussions with Member States. This user manual is intended to serve as a guide to using the tool. There is additional information in built in the tool on the different parameters. When you download and extract the Range Tool there is a sub folder called Doc which contains a number of pdfs giving additional information on the tool. Interested users should read these background documents. Note: the tool is designed to work in Arc GIS versions 9.3 & 10. The examples shown in this user manual relate to version 10. How to open the tool Download and unzipped the zipped range Tool file. In Arc catalog (or Arc Map) open 'Arc Toolbox', right click and 'Add Toolbox', navigate to where you saved the unzipped file and select 'RangeTool.tbx' (or RangeTool93.tbx for Arc GIS 9.3) and select Open and it adds it to your tool box. When you open the Tool box you see the tool is called 'Species and Habitat types Range Tool' Double click the tool to open the dialog box. Page 1 / 14

3 When you select each parameter the text box on the right hand side gives you additional information. Some of the parameters are mandatory (signified by a green got) others are optional. When you download and extract the Range Tool there is a sub folder called Doc which contains a number of pdfs giving additional information on the tool. Interested users should read these background documents; In the following example I will enter a distribution consisting of polygons (though the tool will accept grids, points or polylines). Pre requisites: Distribution: The input for the tool is the distribution of the species, bird or habitat type each record with a UNIQUE IDENTIFIER. There has to be a unique attribute indicating what the species/habitat identifier is. And this unique identifier has to be the same as that used in the checklist for the reporting tool (i.e. species code, habitat type etc); in addition this unique identifier needs to be a TEXT field.. The distribution can consist of any spatial feature, points, polylines, polygons, grids. The shapefiles need to have a prj file attached to them, running the tool without a prj file generates an error. Reference grid: The tool requires a reference grid upon which to calculate the distribution and range. The tool can work with any reference grid, though all data should be in the same projection. If you reproject the ETRS 10x10 grid into your local grid system there is a potential for some distortion. The grid should only include grid cells that are fully within the territory of the country otherwise you may end up with Page 2 / 14

4 portions of the range and distribution in adjacent countries. The EEA ETC/BD can supply the ETRS 5210 LAEA 10x10 grids to Member States (as well as other dimensions where agreed). Checklist: The tool requires a checklist from the reporting tool in order to calculate the range and distribution. Export the checklist for Birds, Species & Habitats before you start using the tool. This is exported as an mdb. Biogeographical region: The tool requires a boundary of the Biogeographical region. The Biogeographical regions shapefile MUST have an Attribute called BIOREG and it must use the standard abbreviations for the biogeographical regions egg ALP for Alpine, BOR for Boreal etc. The EEA ETC/BD can supply this to Member States. The use of biogeographical regions is essential for the Article 17 range maps, for Article 12 use the distribution of the country for this parameter. Gap distance: The tool will create a range based on a predefined grid and a specified gap distance. The explanatory notes for reporting under both directives give additional information on this. If you have features that will use different grids or different gap distances you need to process them separately i.e. if you have some species that you will use 50 x 50km grids to create the range then these must be processed separately from the 10x10km grids. The tool will work with any grid type in any projection BUT all shapefiles need to be in the SAME projection!! How to use the tool 1. Double click the tool in the Arc Toolbox Page 3 / 14

5 2. Select shapefile of distribution 3. Select the attribute in the shapefile that indicates the feature unique identifier 4. Select the reference grid, 5. Upload the Species/Habitat checklist you can export this from the Reporting tool. This is used to select only those grid cells that occur with the biogeographical region the feature occurs in. 6. Upload the Biogeographical region 7. Specify the Gap distance 8. OPTIONAL: if there are certain parts of your country where the range cannot occur you can upload a shapefile of those region or region sand the tool will remove them from the subsequent range map 9. OPTIONAL you can upload the Natura 2000 SDF to facilitate a QA/QC check whereby the resulting distribution and range are compared against the distribution of Natura 2000 sites for that feature. 10. OPTIONAL You can upload the Natura 2000 boundaries 11. OPTIONAL Specify the attribute indicating the Site code 12. Select your output Page 4 / 14

Note: If you select the tick box Process multiple shapefiles or feature classes it will run the tool on ALL shapefiles in the folder, and create ONE Distribution and ONE Range which will have all the

6 Note: If you select the tick box Process multiple shapefiles or feature classes it will run the tool on ALL shapefiles in the folder, and create ONE Distribution and ONE Range which will have all the species/habitat types as records within a merged file. It is best to have all your Example 1: Simple (No QA/QC of Natura 2000 sites) Aim to create the distribution and range for a set of species based on a distribution consisting of a set of polygons from Slovakia. A gap distance of 3 will be used. You open the tool and follow the steps outlined above. Figure 1: screen grab of the Tool user interface The tool can take up to several minutes to calculate the distributions and range. In this example 2 files are created art17_species_distribution_sk_10_etrs_grid_gap3 & Page 5 / 14

7 art17_species_range_sk_10_etrs_grid_gap3. The name includes the name of the input reference grid and the gap distance used. The tool adds the mandatory attributes to the distribution and range files. As well as additional fields where it calculates the area of the distribution and range in each biogeographical region as well as overall (based on the checklist) e.g. the above example shows the distribution and range for species code 1013, Vertigo geyri. Figure 2: shows an example of the distribution and range calculated using the tool The tool also adds one field to highlight if any distribution occurs in a biogeographical region not mentioned in the checklist you have uploaded. The resulting attributes are For Distribution Name Value Description Code 1013 YOUR Unique identifier Page 6 / 14

8 Map Type Range Distribution Group Species Birds/Habitats/Species PAN 0 Area within Pannonian biogeographical region (km²) ALP 4000 Area within Alpine biogeographical region ( km²) Area 4000 Overall area (km²) BioregErr Highlights if a distribution occurs in a region other than that mentioned in the checklist For Range. Name Value Description Code 1013 Unique identifier Map Type Range Distribution/Range Group Species Birds/Habitats/Species PAN 0 Area with Pannonian biogeographical region ( km²) ALP 4000 Area with Alpine biogeographical region ( km²) Area 4000 Overall area (km²) Grid Sk ETRS 10x10km Range only: Grid used Gap 3 Range only: Gap distance used You should add to this the ISO 2 digit country code To edit the range While the tool generates an automated range you may want to edit this file and remove certain grid cells. The tool allows you to do this through uploading a feature Page 7 / 14

9 identifying the grid cells that you would like to remove, this can be a point, multi point, line, polygon, grid. If you know in advance which cells are to be excluded you can run the tool from the start and add this parameter. On the other hand if after you generate your automated range you decide that certain grids should be remove, you can re run the tool for that feature, or features, and it will create a new range (I would suggest you put these in a new folder as you will have duplicate files and then to delete the original files). You can upload points fro specific features add unique id Based on the following example I decide that 2 grids should be removed from the range (marked in orange) (figure 3) Figure 3: Highlighted in orange are the grid cells I would like to remove Steps: Page 8 / 14

10 1. Identify which grids are to be removed 2. create a feature within each grid cells (can be a point, multi point, line, polygon, grid), 3. This feature must have an attribute name exactly the same as the species/habitat identifier of the distribution file. 4. Re run tool using the Exclude from range parameter Figure 4: shows the output of the tool with the grid cells removed. (Compare with figure 2) QA/QC with Natura 2000 sites The tool also has the option to compare the resulting distribution/range with the distribution of Natura 2000 sites designated for a species/habitat/bird. As with the above examples you load the basic input data (your distribution, Checklist, Reference Grid, Biogeographical region) fill out your gap distance and in addition you Page 9 / 14

11 add 2 additional datasets the 1 st is the Natura 2000 Standard Data form database and the 2 nd is the Natura 2000 spatial dataset. This spatial dataset needs to be in the same projection as all your other inputs and you need to identify the SITECODE field in the spatial dataset. The tool then uses the Habitat Code/Species Code to compare your distribution to the Natura 2000 sites designated fro that habitat type or species. This is an additional check that can be run and can show potential anomalies. The Member States can then choose to act on these issues. In the following example I have created a deliberately incorrect distribution to highlight how the tool works. My input is the distribution for a species e.g. 1013, Vertigo geyri. The tool will compare my distribution with those Natura 2000 sites designated fro this species. The output will be. Shapefile of the distribution (as before) Shapefile of the range (as before) A Shapefile of those Natura 2000 sites that do not match the distribution (new) Page 10 / 14

12 Figure 5: screen grab of the Tool user interface In addition in the table for the distribution adds 2 additional fields 1. N2K_250km: this lists any Natura 2000 sites designated for the feature that are over 250km from the distribution you have created 2. MissingN2K: This lists the Natura 2000 sites designated for that feature that DO NOT overlap with your distribution. In the above, intentionally incorrect, example the tool identifies 5 Natura 2000 sites [in orange] that do not overlap with the distribution (as can be seen in the following image); I can use this information to evaluate my initial distribution information. Page 11 / 14

13 Figure 6: shows the output of the tool when using the Natura 2000 QA/QC note in orange the Natura 2000 sites that do not overlap with the distribution Additional information In the range Tool folder that you initially downloaded there is a folder called Docs which contains a series of pdf documents which give more detailed information. Users should consult these documents prior to using the tool. Page 12 / 14

14 Submission of Spatial data: For submission of data for Article 12 or Article 17 the data has to be in the projection ETRS 5210 LAEA Data to consist of 10x10km grids, except where exceptions have been granted. The use of attributes to indicate if a grid cell is filled or not is not allowed. You are also allowed to submit data in your native projection 1 shapefile for Birds, 1 for Species and 1 for Habitats Attributes of data The shapefiles should have as a minimum the following attributes Code MapType Group MS (Habitat Code/Species Code/Birds Code) (Distribution /Range) (Habitat /Species/Birds) ISO 2 digit country code (Add this to the attributes created by the tool) Other relevant attributes include those generated by the tool itself. Page 13 / 14

15 Follow up Software: Updates of software will be available to download here. Article 12: For additional information on Article 12 including FAQs consult the Article 12 reference portal Article 17: For additional information on Article 17 including FAQs consult the Article 12 reference portal Contact us Page 14 / 14

Article 17 Reporting Assessments of conservation status. at the EU biogeographical level. Public consultation

European Environment Agency European Topic Centre on Biological Diversity Technical paper 3/2014 Article 17 Reporting Assessments of conservation status at the EU biogeographical level Public This is a