Selección del terreno de escape y cobertura vegetal del borrego cimarrón (Ovis canadensis cremnobates) en Baja California, mediante Técnicas de Teledetección Satelital

Community-Based Workshops to Involve Rural Communities in Wildlife Management Case Study: Bighorn Sheep in Baja California, Mexico

“…On the other hand, the participative maps elaborated based on the information generated during the second workshop are important tools to manage the bighorn sheep in the study locations, since besides locating the important areas for the species, they show if these areas are impacted by any of the risk factors above-mentioned (Figure S1: Participatory map of ejido Cordillera Molina; Figure S2: Participatory map of ejido Matomí). In ejido Cordillera Molina it can be considered that the information given during the participative mapping workshop is precise because the areas pointed as important for the species match with the ones identified in Sierra Juárez by Ruíz et al [23] who identified them through a potential distribution model; while in ejido Matomí, participative mapping allowed to identify important areas for the species that had not been identified in other studies held in mountain range Santa Isabel [24].…”

“…It is located on the coast of the Gulf of California south of the port town of San Felipe. The surface area is 224,094 ha (https://phina.ran.gob.mx/index.php accessed on 22 March 2022), which has the environmental conditions for the presence of the bighorn sheep in the Santa Isabel mountain range [24] (Figure 1). This ejido has 30 human settlements, 29 of which are fishing camps mainly dedicated to sport fishing; the remaining is a livestock farm and hunting ranch, in which cattle and horses are raised, and mule deer hunting is practiced (http://www.conabio.gob.mx/informacion/metadata/gis/unikloc10gw.…”

“…This has created a relationship of trust between the community and the researchers; in addition, the mountain range in which this ejido is located, the Sierra Juarez, is on the international border between Mexico and the United States and is a key point of functional connectivity for bighorn sheep populations [25]. The research team had no previous relationship with the ejido Matomí; however, it was decided to work with this community because the Sierra Santa Isabel, located within the ejido Matomí polygon, is the mountain range with the largest contiguous bighorn sheep habitat in the state of Baja California [24]. The ejido Matomí is an agrarian society constituted by 170 ejidatarios.…”

Waterhole detection using a vegetation index in desert bighorn sheep (Ovis canadensis cremnobates) habitat

“…NDVI utilises the absorption proportions in the red (R) region and vegetation cover reflectance in the near-infrared (NIR) region [18]. NDVI was calculated with the following equation: NDVI = NIR−R/NIR + R. The NDVI values ranged from −1.0 to 1.0, In the Sierra the values of NDVI < 0.05 indicated scarce vegetation [20]. We used a threshold of NDVI > 0.19 for detecting waterholes.…”

“…We used the NDWI and NDVI for waterhole detection because these algorithms use spectral bands with 10-meter spatial resolution, which detects waterholes with areas of 100 m 2 , increasing the detection of waterholes in comparison to the MNDWI. The NDVI is useful for detecting waterholes because in arid ecosystems higher NDVI will represent areas of greener vegetation, and should therefore represent areas of greater surface water availability [18,19, 20]. Also, the NDVI has positive correlation with plant cover and biomass productivity [21, 22, 23].…”