LLBN Carbon-Biodiversity Project

KEY DETAILS

PI: Dr. Matthew Rogan
Date; 16 October 2023
Version; v0.1.0
Programme; Rangelands Biodiversity Project (RBP)
Study Site; Lewa-Lolldaiga-Borana-Ngare Ndare (LLBN)
Key partners; Leverhulme Center for Nature Recovery, University of Liverpool
Contact email; mrogan@naturalstate.org

1. PREAMBLE

Natural State’s objectives and activities are governed by a set of accepted Design Documents (DDs). These documents describe the context and purpose of all Natural State porjects. Each DD documents key project details, the objective and background of the project, features of the study area, and the general methodological framework. Specific methodological details may be found in the project Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) which is available in the Related Documents section below.

1.1 DD PURPOSE

To provide a clear understanding of the purpose of each Natural State project and its contribution to Natural State’s mission of facilitating nature restoration at scale by using the latest technology and methods to revolutionise impact monitoring for carbon, biodiversity and human well-being.

1.2 DD SCOPE

This document details how this project fits within Natural State’s Impact-Insights strategy and the principal team members overseeing the project. It explains why the project was conceived and how it will be implemented. It further directs readers to where they can find additional information relevant to the project.

2. GLOSSARY

BACI: Before-After Control-Impact survey design
Camera-trap: A remote camera with a defined automatic trigger (e.g., motion, time-lapse)
CPP: Carbon Pool Plot. A 50m X 50m sampling site within which NS measures aboveground and belowground carbon stocks.
Deployment: The period of time a single remote sensor is active within the environment at a single, defined station as part of a survey.
Exclosure: A defined area fenced for the purposes of preventing some species of wild animals from accessing the area.
GEM: Global Ecological Monitoring. A global biological research project to measure ecological processes.
A 50m X 50m sampling site within which NS measures aboveground and belowground carbon stocks and rates of carbon cycling.
Project: A concerted, data-driven effort to robustly measure variation in Biodiversity, Carbon, or Human-wellbeing in response to one or more sources of heterogeneity in a designated landscape.
Remote Sensor: An electronic sensor with automated data collecting capabilities that operate independently of a human handler.
S123: Survey123, a field-data collection app from ESRI which NS uses for recording all field observations and survey metadata.
Sampling Protocol: Explicit survey methodology that describes the design, effort, duration, configuration, and operation of a camera-trap survey.
Station: A point location where sampling occurs in space.
Study Area: A defined geographic region of interest within which one or more surveys investigate ecological patterns at one or more sites.
Survey: A set of simultaneous deployments of remote sensors over a defined period of time at a coordinated set of stations for the purposes of collecting data on the environment and its communities.

3. PROJECT OVERVIEW

3.1 PROJECT AIMS

The Rangelands Carbon-Biodiversity project aims to:

Identify correlations between vertebrate diversity and carbon stocks
Measure the effect of vegetation structure on vertebrate diversity.
Provide robust measures of grazing and browsing activity as predictors of carbon stocks.

3.2 PROJECT BACKGROUND

Natural State’s mission is to restore African landscapes with benefits for carbon, biodiversity and human wellbeing. To maximize outcomes for all three streams, we must understand how the three streams relate to each other. The Rangelands Carbon-Biodiversity Project is designed to robustly investigate the relationship between above- and belowground carbon stocks and biodiversity through intensive sampling of biodiversity where carbon stocks are measured. This research will provide invaluable context for understanding patterns in both carbon and biodiversity. The primary objective of the Rangelands Carbon-Biodiversity survey (hereafter ‘the survey’) is to measure mammal and bird diversity, local (relative) abundance, and relative intensity of use of sites where we have precise information on soil conditions, vegetation structure, invertebrate activity, and above-ground carbon stocks. The data collected will provide insights into the relationship between vertebrate activity and carbon stocks and provide more precise measures of grazing activity to inform long-term monitoring of carbon stocks. Additionally, the data will be used for integrated modeling of plant diversity, soil conditions, and vertebrate populations. The survey can be considered open-ended in the sense that it can be replicated wherever carbon sampling occurs and camera-trap or bioacoustic monitoring is feasible.

3.3 STUDY AREA

The Lewa-Lolldaiga-Borana-Ngare Ndare (LLBN) study site is a savanna rangeland landscape in the central highlands of Kenya that extends north from the lower slopes of Mt. Kenya, straddling the boundary between Meru and Laikipia counties. The four main properties are located at 0.11 = 0.34° latitude and 37.07-37.53° longitude. The study site-centered ecosystem (SCE) exhibits three main “arms” with on extending south around the western edge of Mt. Kenya, one extending east along the southern side of the B9 highway to the northeastern edge of Meru County, and the longest and largest arm extending 130 km northwest to Maralal with some isolated islands of similar ecosystem to the north and west. The entire SCE is located between -0.3° and 2.3° latitude, and between 36.3° and 38.1° longitude.

Rainfall is highly variable, but is typically between 400 and 600 mm annually. During droughts, total annual rainfall can drop below 200 mm. Rainfall generally follows a north-south gradient with more rainfall at higher elevations in the south. The landscape sits at 1400-2370 m with higher elevations in Ngare-Ndare forest and south-central Lolldaiga and the lowest elevations in Lewa and northeast Borana. Soil types are highly variable throughout the landscape but consist primarily of Luvisols (Haplic and Vertic) and Dystric Regosols. Vegetation communities are predominantly Acacia-Commiphora bushlands and thickets with montane forests at higher elevations (Dinerstein et al. 2017).

Each of the four core properties are subject to divergent management practices. Lewa Wildlife Conservancy is mostly owned by The Nature Conservancy but has a number of small, privately owned enclaves. The reserve is almost exclusively used for photographic tourism but does have some livestock grazing, especially along the community road and in a section nicknamed ‘Bosnia’ where the community have grazing rights. Over the last 30 years, the conservancy has increasingly adopted elephant and large-mammal exclosures as a major management practice aimed at increasing tree cover on the conservancy.

Lolldaiga ranch is principally a livestock ranch but is also used by free ranging wildlife. Historically, the ranch was intensively grazed but recently new management has implemented a regenerative grazing regime based on intensive grazing by a few large, fast-moving herds. The grazing regime is intended to stimulate grass productivity and prevent selective grazing by livestock herds.

Borana Conservancy is a dual use wildlife and livestock ranch that also includes privately owned enclaves. In addition to photographic tourism, the conservancy produces cattle and has a partnership with a local community that extends limiting grazing rights to community herders. Borana has a few large-mammal exclosures, especially along the river that runs between Lewa and Borana.

Ngare-Ndare forest is a state forest reserve but is managed by the Ngare-Ndare Forest Trust on behalf of six villages. The Trust administers sustainable use of the forest by the six communities, predominantly for firewood collection and grazing. The forest also has small-scale tourism operations. The forest is predominantly populated with wild olives and junipers.

North of Lewa, Borana, and Lolldaiga are several community conservancies that practice predominatly pastoral lifestyles as well as the Mukogodo Forest, which is a forest conservancy managed on behalf of four neighboring communities. On the western boundary of Lolldaiga Ranch is Kupona, a small experiemental plot for testing restoration interventions.

The Carbon-Biodiversity Survey will be conducted across Lewa, Borana, and Ngare-Ndare forest conservancies with an emphasis on sampling the full range of management conditions within the three properties. This includes sampling inside and outside mammal exclosures, within intact and degraded forest patches, and across the full range of livestock management practices (no livestock, sparse livestock, intensive livestock, and regenerative grazing).

3.4 PROJECT TIMELINE

Activity	2023 Q4	2024 Q1	2024 Q2	2024 Q3	2024 Q4	2025 Q1	2025 Q2	2025 Q3	2025 Q4	2026 Q1	2026 Q4
Data collection	X	X	X	X			X	X
Data analysis			X	X	X				X	X
Output targets						1			2		3

4. SURVEY DESIGN

The survey consists of a series of semi-independent deployments with each deployment aligned with an element of carbon sampling including both GEM plots and Carbon Pool plots. As sample plots are drawn from the set of Carbon Pool and GEM plots, the survey follows a stratified random sampling design augmented with manually selected sampling locations. The survey will employ a combination of passive detectors of vertebrates and human observations of plant diversity. These data will then be combined with existing measures of carbon stocks from the same sites generated from the Total Carbon Survey.

4.1 SPATIAL DESIGN

All survey sites are drawn from the set of 50 m X 50 m sites included in the GEM survey and the Total Carbon survey. Sub-surveys are broken down by carbon site type (i.e., GEM or CPP) and property (i.e., Lolldaiga, Lewa-Borana, Ngare-Ndare). Details of the spatial design can be found in the design documents for the (Global Ecological Monitoring project)[INSERT LINK] and the (Total Carbon project)[INSERT LINK].

4.2 TEMPORAL DESIGN

The temporal design of the survey should track the temporal sampling from the corresponding carbon survey. Where long-term monitoring of carbon occurs (i.e., GEM plots) vertebrate monitoring will be replicated seasonally. Where carbon sampling is replicated over time (e.g., CP plots that are part of the exclosure BACI survey), vertebrate sampling should occur whenever the carbon is sampled. Where carbon is only sampled once, vertebrate sampling should occur for a single deployment.

4.3 SUB-SURVEYS

The Carbon-Biodiversity is comprised of the following Sub-surveys. Some Sub-surveys are critical to the project, while others are subject to research capacity and resource availability.

Critical Sub-surveys

GEM short wet 2023 (October – December 2023)
GEM long wet 2024 (April – June 2024)
GEM long dry 2024 (August – September 2024)
GEM long wet 2025 (April – June 2025)
GEM long dry 2025 (August – September 2025)
Ngare-Ndare CPP (dates TBD)
Kupona Baseline (unconfirmed)
Kupona 2026 (unconfirmed)

Preferred Sub-surveys

Matunda BACI CPP (October 2023 – March 2024)
Lolldaiga CPP (dates TBD)
Lewa-Borana CPP part 1 (dates TBD)
Lewa-Borana CPP part 2 (dates TBD)
Lewa-Borana CPP part 3 (dates TBD)

Sub-surveys are subject to change as the NS carbon sampling efforts and resources evolve.

5. SAMPLING DESIGN

Each carbon plot will consist of two camera stations and one AudioMoth station. Station selection is fixed and the field team should position devices as close to the prescribed station location as possible without compromising sampling effectiveness of both the device and any ongoing or future carbon sampling. Camera trap stations are located at carbon plot reference points F1M1-2 and F1M3-4 (i.e., the southern edge midpoint and the northern edge midpoint; see Fig 2 below). AudioMoth stations are located at the plot centroid (reference point F1CE).

Sampling for each deployment should generally follow standard NS protocols for passive recorders. All recorders should operate for a minimum of 30 days but at GEM plots, sampling will extend beyond the 30-day window to provide richer datasets. In particular, the duration of rainy season sampling will depend heavily on rainfall patterns.

All recorders (cameras and audiomoths) at GEM plots should be powered by rechargeable eneloop batteries. Batteries should be replaced and data downloaded from all three recorders every two weeks.

5.1 CAMERA-TRAPPING

Camera-trapping will generally follow standard NS camera-trapping procedures. Briefly, cameras will be placed inside the carbon plots near to the south and north midpoints oriented towards the plot centroid. Cameras will operate for a minimum of 30 days using motion triggers.

Cameras will not be deployed at Ngare-Ndare forest carbon pool plots.

5.2 BIOACOUSTICS

Bioacoustic sampling will generally follow standard NS bioacoustic sampling procedures. One AudioMoth will be deployed within the carbon plot near to the plot centroid and will operate for a minimum of 30 days.

5.3 TREE SAMPLING

Trees will be identified, counted, and measured according to the sampling protocols for the GEM and Total Carbon projects.

GRASS AND FORB DIVERSITY

The diversity and proportional abundance of grasses and forbs will be estimated according to the sampling protocols for the GEM and Total Carbon projects.

6. ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK

Data will be analyzed using the full suite of NS hierarchical models including community occupancy and Royle-Nichols abundance models for bird populations and multiscale occupancy, N-mixture, and Royle-Nichols abundance models of mammal populations. Additionally, the Wildlife Picture Index (O’Brien et al. 2010) will be calculated using single-species models for the long-term temporally replicated data from GEM plots.

Acoustic diversity indices will be calculated from acoustic recordings and used to predict site diversity metrics.

Through a collaboration with researchers at MIT, the data will be investigated for inferences from weakly coupled multi-modal datasets using camera-trap, bioacoustic, and remotely sensed data.

Additional analyses of plant and tree diversity are yet to be determined.

7. EXPECTED OUTPUTS

A scientific research paper on the spatial relationship between a suite of biodiversity metrics and carbon stocks.
A scientific research paper on the temporal relationship between a suite of biodiversity metrics and carbon stocks.
An internal report documenting a framework for restoration in African savannas that couples biological intactness with carbon storage and sequestration.

8.1 STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURE

Draft SOP

8.2 OUTPUTS

Not currently available.

8.3 DATA ELEMENTS

Survey Design

Data Collection

Data Layers

Project Map (not currently available)
S123 feature layer - Camera-trapping (not currently available)
S123 feature layer - Bioacoustics (not currently available)
S123 feature layer - Large trees (not currently available)
S123 feature layer - Small trees (not currently available)
S123 feature layer - Plants (not currently available)

Dashboard

Not currently available

8.4 ADMINISTRATIVE DOCUMENTS