How to Achieve Endorsement from the Plan Committee

1. Linking JV Implementation Plan Criteria to NAWMP Continental Assessment Recommendations How to Achieve Endorsement from the Plan Committee

2. How Implementation Plan Criteria relate to ASC Recommendations NSST response to Continental Assessment Report Tackling the long quiet issue of NAWMP review and approval of JV implementation plans.

3. Support the NSST 5) Plan progress requires a commitment to support M & E, within and among the JVs and through the NSST. 20) PC should advocate that waterfowl harvest and habitat managers develop a coherent approach for achieving Plan objectives. 21) NSST should be revitalized to tackle assignments from this assessment and from the parallel Joint Task Group on NAWMP population objectives.

4. NSST’s Implementation Plan Review Committee Bringing new Joint Ventures along in Implementation Planning…

5. Required IP Elements: • Planning Scale • Priority Species • Limiting Factors • Species/Habitat Relationships • Population Objectives • Habitat Assessment • Carrying Capacity • Habitat Objectives

6. Explain and justify boundaries and/or the planning scale used (Waterfowl/Bird Conservation Regions, states, etc.). 8) JV actions should be guided by explicit biological models. This should be the standard planning method in all JVs. 10) Global climate change should be given more consideration in JV regional targeting, program emphasis, and project design. 11) Wetland conservation in the western Canadian and U.S. boreal forest regions should be more explicitly connected to the Plan. Planning Scale:

7. Identify priority species, importance of proposed JV to priority species, and any seasonal emphasis within implementation plan for priority species (e.g., breeding vs. nonbreeding). Explain and justify the process for selecting priority waterfowl species, guilds, or subsets. If priority species/populations recommended in the 2004 NAWMP update are excluded, explain why. A comprehensive review of Plan objectives should be a high priority leading up to the next Plan Update. There remain unresolved concerns about addressing spp. for which no population objectives exist. Priority Species:

8. Identify priority species, importance of proposed JV to priority species, and any seasonal emphasis within implementation plan for priority species (e.g., breeding vs. nonbreeding). Explain and justify the process for selecting priority waterfowl species, guilds, or subsets. If priority species/populations recommended in the 2004 NAWMP update are excluded, explain why. In biological planning, diving ducks, sea ducks, over-abundant goose species, and species of special concern (e.g., LESC, NOPI) deserve greater attention. 23) The species and habitat JVs should communicate more and better integrate their missions. Priority Species:

9. Identify the range of factors acting within the proposed JV that are believed to have greatest impact on waterfowl population growth and that may limit waterfowl from attaining population objectives. Subsequent planning likely will be based on species that are habitat limited. A comprehensive review of Plan objectives should be a high priority leading up to the next Plan Update. Setting objectives in the face of environmental variation. Should we plan for worse case scenarios? Given dynamic environments should Plan goals be expressed more explicitly in terms of ranges of population objectives representing poor and good conditions. Limiting Factors:

10. Identify the range of factors acting within the proposed JV that are believed to have greatest impact on waterfowl population growth and that may limit waterfowl from attaining population objectives. Subsequent planning likely will be based on species that are habitat limited. PC should develop a more robust accountability framework for achieving NAWMP biological objectives involving all organizational levels in the Plan Community. Improved understanding of how landscape variation and habitat accomplishments influence vital rates. Limiting Factors:

11. Explain the relationship between priority species and their important habitats (e.g., habitat use, breeding bird densities, recruitment or survival rates, body condition, food biomass and energy content, etc.). 5) Plan progress requires a commitment to support M & E within and among the JVs and through the NSST. PC should develop a more robust accountability framework for achieving NAWMP biological objectives involving all organizational levels in the Plan Community. Development of more informative performance metrics to better guide management. Species/Habitat Relationships:

12. Explain and justify population objectives (abundance, vital rates, trends, etc.). Explain how objectives are stepped down from NAWMP continental objectives, or if not, explain why. If vital rate or population objectives are not developed, explain why. PC should develop a more robust accountability framework for achieving NAWMP biological objectives involving all organizational levels in the Plan Community. Review approaches and assumptions associated with stepping down continental population goals to regional population and habitat goals. Population Objectives:

13. Explain and justify population objectives (abundance, vital rates, trends, etc.). Explain how objectives are stepped down from NAWMP continental objectives, or if not, explain why. If vital rate or population objectives are not developed, explain why. A comprehensive review of Plan objectives should be a high priority leading up to the next Plan Update. Variable approaches to translating continental population goals into regional habitat objectives. Improved understanding of how landscape variation and habitat accomplishments influence vital rates. Population Objectives:

14. Explain how habitats were assessed (quantity, quality, landscape juxtaposition, etc.) to aid in determining status of priority species or habitat types deemed critical to those species. All JVs must develop the technical ability to address basic biological foundation issues. Need to… Assess ongoing “net landscape change” to evaluate progress toward attaining Plan population objectives. Describe landscape conditions needed to achieve objectives. Link landscape composition to waterfowl population dynamics Habitat Assessment:

15. Estimate current carrying capacity of JV landscape for priority species and document methods used to derive estimates. This is normally done using conceptual or statistical models incorporating habitat conditions and relationships between birds and habitats. Compare current carrying capacity to population objectives to determine if habitat shortfalls exist. 3) Adaptive Management needs to be embraced more widely. JV actions should be guided by explicit biological models. This should be the standard planning method in all JVs. Models that tie populations to habitats and management in a particular landscape provide the basis for setting transparent objectives Carrying Capacity:

16. Identify priority habitat types and present habitat objectives for each, showing linkages to population objectives (e.g., addressing deficits in current carrying capacity), negative trends in important habitats, etc. If JV is subdivided into smaller regions to facilitate more efficient implementation, habitat objectives should be provided for each of those regions. PC should develop a more robust accountability framework for achieving NAWMP biological objectives involving all organizational levels in the Plan Community. Better monitoring of key habitat trends. Improved tracking of habitat accomplishments. Habitat Objectives:

17. Identify priority habitat types and present habitat objectives for each, showing linkages to population objectives (e.g., addressing deficits in current carrying capacity), negative trends in important habitats, etc. If JV is subdivided into smaller regions to facilitate more efficient implementation, habitat objectives should be provided for each of those regions. NAWMP partners should promote farming practices that are appealing to producers and benefit waterfowl. 17) Plan partners should promote policy disincentives for converting native grassland to cropland in the U.S. and Canadian Prairies. Habitat Objectives:

18. Desired IP Elements: • Spatial Decision Support Tools • Conservation Budget

19. Identify and explain the development of spatial decision support tools that may be used to guide habitat delivery (e.g., priority areas/sites; which conservation actions to apply in which geographic areas, etc.). Decision Support Tools combine: Geospatial data Biological information Results of ecological models … into a format that helps managers decide which conservation actions to apply to a given landscape PC should develop a more robust accountability framework for achieving NAWMP biological objectives involving all organizational levels in the Plan Community. Better monitoring of key habitat trends. Improved understanding of how landscape variation & habitat accomplishments influence vital rates. Promote efficiency by combining priorities identifiedby decision support tools for multiple species representing a shared benefit from a particular conservation action. Spatial Decision Support Tools:

20. Describe and justify the cost of conservation actions necessary to develop a landscape capable of supporting population objectives. PC should develop a more robust accountability framework for achieving NAWMP biological objectives involving all organizational levels in the Plan Community. Better monitoring of key habitat trends. Improved tracking of habitat accomplishments. 3) Adaptive mgmt. needs to be embraced more widely. 4) All JVs must develop the technical ability to address biological foundation issues. 5) Plan progress requires a commitment to support M&E within & among the JVs and through the NSST. Conservation Budget:

21. Embrace 4 elements of SHC Science-based conservation assessment Represents an improvement of our business practices and processes to better enable us to account for how we do things and to target resources more efficiently toward accomplishing our mission. • Biological Planning • Conservation Design • Conservation Delivery • Monitoring & Research Acknowledging our own folks: Rex Johnson, Charles Baxter, Bill Uihlein

22. Embrace SHC SHC becomes “strategic” because on-the-ground actions are based on planning and design and measured through monitoring and research. • Work on improving our biological planning • IT is the key to conservation design…prioritize. • Conservation delivered must be monitored • Identify explicit assumptions • Test those that are most critical • ARM – reduce uncertainties Assess the outcomes of our management actions

23. HAPPY ANNIVERSARY