Spatial prioritisation for nature recovery with multiple options for habitat creation

Abstract The creation of habitat in landscapes which have been largely cleared of natural vegetation and depleted of wildlife has become a key focus in research and policy addressing declines in biodiversity. A major challenge for nature recovery in such landscapes, particularly those with long histories of agricultural use, is how to meet species population targets effectively when (i) complex and intersecting realities of land use mean that available land for habitat creation is limited, (ii) multiple habitats could be viable within any given land parcel, because restoration of historical habitat states may be neither possible nor desirable and (iii) the potential suitability of actions varies with regional species priorities and other landscape‐specific requirements. In the context of nature recovery, existing spatial prioritisation approaches have tended to be used for, and have been best suited to, restoring historical habitat states. This does not tackle the issue of deciding between different available habitats for creation at each land parcel, nor how the desirability of habitat in a given land parcel is contingent on such choices being made in the surrounding landscape. In this paper, we introduce a spatial prioritisation model, Ebrel, which is designed for landscapes where any one of multiple habitat types could be supported within a single land parcel, based on present environmental conditions. The model also accounts for the spatial configuration of actions and species dispersal thresholds, so that newly created habitats iteratively contribute to population targets for collectives of species with differing habitat requirements. We demonstrate the approach using a case study from The Lizard peninsula of Cornwall, in the United Kingdom, and how this method can be used to meet nature recovery targets for multiple species with varying resource requirements and dispersal traits. Synthesis and applications . The Ebrel model provides a flexible approach to the challenge of identifying priority areas, and meeting biodiversity targets, for nature recovery in landscapes where there are multiple choices for habitat creation at any given available land parcel.