EAGLES User Manual

Kezia Manlove, Daniel Weiss, Jennifer Sheldon

Yellowstone Ecological Research Center

2011

[NOTE: while the programming behind EAGLES is currently obsolete because of an ArcGIS version update, this manual is an excellent, user-friendly primer to ecological modeling for habitat suitability, resource selection, ecological forecasting, and other modeling applications. Perhaps there’s a programmer out there who can revitalize this valuable tool that brings the power of RSF modeling to biologists, wildlife managers, and other non-stats expert users? — Patrick Cross, 2019]

This manual outlines a workflow and a set of software tools collectively known as the Ecosystem Assessment Geospatial Analysis & Landscape Evaluation System (EAGLES). EAGLES is designed to aid resource management decision making by providing support for species habitat planning efforts that integrate changing landscape conditions with demographic responses. Managers seeking to evaluate multiple development plan proposals can use this system to compare alternatives and scenarios, including changes in land-use practices, and explore their implications using hypothetical ‘what-if’ scenarios. For example, a manager could use this set of tools to investigate how coyotes currently use a portion of landscape, and how that use pattern might change when the landscape is altered (e.g., through fire, flood, or development). These tools are particularly relevant for legacy data on species of concern. To reach the widest possible audience, an ArcGIS environment was selected as the platform for these tools.