An Invitation:

The San Diego Management and Monitoring Program invites you to a one-day workshop at which we will leverage your expertise to plan monitoring and management of linkages and connectivity in San Diego County.

Background:

In San Diego County, hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent in assembling a regional preserve system. In order for the preserve system to provide the benefits anticipated in the various conservation plans, the plans assumed that core areas would be connected by habitat linkages. Over the past seven years, the assembly of cores and linkages has progressed significantly as has the science regarding how linkages connect core areas. Over the next ten years, tens of thousands of additional acres will be added to conserved core areas and linkages. These cores and linkages are intended to provide for the conservation of hundreds of species, many of them threatened or endangered.

Current Need:

We now face the challenge of:

· evaluating the extent to which linkages are functioning as anticipated,

· identifying what may be adversely affecting the linkage functionality,

· developing a long-term program to monitor core area connectivity, and

· determining how identified linkage stressors can be ameliorated

To this end, we have:

· identified multiple core areas that have been significantly assembled and the linkages committed to in the plans that would connect them, and

· selected several priority linkages on which we would like to initially focus.

We need your help to:

· select five linkages from the high priority linkages identified,

· formulate the correct questions that should be asked regarding each selected linkage,

· assess the role of connectivity for the selected linkage in conserving biodivers