Cost-Efficient Reserve Site Selection Favoring Persistence of Threatened and Endangered Species

This article formulates and tests set covering and related models with spatial characteristics for selecting sites that provide habitat for species that are identified as “critical” (e.g., typically threatened, endangered, or rare), thereby enhancing their persistence. The first two models presented require the creation of a core area for each critical species and a buffer zone surrounding the core, with and without being constrained to include at least one representation of each and every common (i.e., noncritical) species. The final model aims at minimizing costs of protecting predetermined numbers of common species while all critical species remain covered and buffered. These models are implemented for occurrence data of terrestrial mammals in Oregon. They enable, among other things, a comparison between the budgetary impacts of reserve networks with and without buffering rings for critical species, and a determination of the marginal cost of common species protection.