Natural resource condition assessment: Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
Stoms DM, Jantz PA, Davis FW. 2013. Natural resource condition assessment: Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. Natural Resource Report. NPS/SAMO/NRR—2013/715. National Park Service
This report is an assessment of condition of the natural resources of Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area (SAMO) and an evaluation of the threats and stressors that act on these resources. The analysis was conducted primarily in 2009 through 2010 to provide NPS managers, interpreters, and planners with a synthesis of the most current information on the natural resources in and around SAMO. Two fundamental themes permeate this condition assessment: 1) the pervasive ways that anthropogenic drivers affect the key resources at SAMO and 2) the interconnectedness of resources. The human population continues to expand and intensify in the region, generating a litany of interacting stressors. For example, increasing housing development leads to increases in rodenticide application, irrigation runoff, nitrogen deposition, skyglow, noise, road kill, and wildfire risk. These stressors threaten mesopredators, aquatic habitats, gene flow, native vegetation, lichen communities, and favor invasions by non-native plants and animals. Future development may also imperil SAMOs tenuous connectivity with other blocks of natural landscapes to the north. There are also emerging issues that may become of greater management concern in the future, most obvious of these being climate change. Minimum winter temperatures and maximum summer temperatures are both forecasted to increase, while models are less consistent in forecasting precipitation changes. Most ecological resources in SAMO would be affected by these changes in climate, including the frequency of wildfire and the area burned; plant-pollinator phenology; range shifts of plant and animal species; and added stress on amphibians. The report also identifies data gaps that, if filled, would improve the usefulness of the stressor or resource condition indicators assessed in future reports. These data would either improve the accuracy of the indicator value or in many cases provide trend information where only baseline values are currently known.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Stoms, David; Jantz, Patrick; Davis, Frank
- Date of Issue
- 2013-09
- Publisher
- National Park Service
- Units
- MEDN , NRSS , SAMO
- Keywords
- Air Quality, Climate, Fire Regime, Land Use, natural resource condition assessment, PWR-toolkit, Resource Management, Santa Monica Mountains, Vegetation, Water Resources, Wildlife