Lindsay M. Dreiss

• MSc, PhD
• Director at Defenders of Wildlife

The National Wildlife Refuge System (NWRS) presents an opportunity for climate‐change refugia conservation through the expansion of the U.S. protected areas network. Dedicated to conserving and restoring fish, wildlife, and plants and their habitats, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) uses best available science to assess three main criteri...

We synthesized reported threats to US imperiled species to identify which of the five predominant drivers of biodiversity loss—climate change, invasive species, land and sea use change, pollution, and overexploitation—negatively influence species persistence across taxa. Using threats identified at listing under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), In...

Deciding where to implement actions for biodiversity conservation remains challenging for many reasons, including the increase in maps aimed at prioritizing locations for conservation efforts. Although a growing numbers of maps can create the perception of uncertainty and competing science, a shared set of principles underlie many mapping initiativ...

The U.S. needs a National Biodiversity Strategy (hereafter Strategy). As a nation that places a high value on domestic biodiversity and on being a global leader in biodiversity conservation, the U.S. is failing to live up to its expectations regarding a national Strategy. A Strategy should suggest both legislation and policies and guide our country...

In an effort to combat the dual climate and biodiversity crises, the international community has put forth targets to reduce emissions and protect species. Habitat degradation is at the fore in driving species extinctions and carbon loss, creating an urgent need to examine our land-use practices if we are to meet international goals. Individual nat...

The Golden-cheeked Warbler (Setophaga chrysoparia) is a Neotropical migratory songbird that is listed as endangered under the U.S. Endangered Species Act, breeds exclusively in central Texas, and is heavily impacted by habitat conversion. The species relies on mixed ashe juniper (Juniperus ashei) and oak (Quercus) woodlands for nest-building and sh...

In addition to changes associated with climate and land use, parrots are threatened by hunting and capture for the pet trade, making them one of the most at risk orders of birds for which conservation action is especially important. Species richness is often used to identify high priority areas for conserving biodiversity. By definition, richness c...

The genetically and geographically isolated Cook Inlet beluga whale (CIB) was listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act in 2008 and a federal recovery plan was adopted in 2016. Despite these measures, the population has failed to make demonstrable progress toward recovery. Data and knowledge gaps exist, as well as high uncertainty in th...

Protecting areas for climate adaptation will be essential to ensuring greater opportunity for species conservation well into the future. However, many proposals for protected areas expansion focus on our understanding of current spatial patterns, which may be ineffective surrogates for future needs. A science-driven call to address the biodiversity...

Achieving ambitious goals to conserve at least 30% of U.S. lands and waters by 2030 ("30 × 30") will require a multiscale baseline understanding of current protections, key decisionmakers, and policy tools for moving forward. To help conservationists and decisionmakers support the science-based call to address the biodiversity and climate crises, w...

International and national initiatives aim to conserve at least 30% of lands and waters by 2030. To safeguard biodiversity, conservation actions must be distributed in places that represent ecosystem and species diversity. Various methods of prioritizing sites for conservation have been used in local and global assessments. However, the performance...

Temperate deciduous forests are one of the most visible biomes on Earth because of their autumn aesthetics and because they harbor some of the most heavily populated regions. Their ability to attract visitors may increase opportunities for people to experience nature, which has been linked to greater conservation action. Identifying regions with hi...

The Golden-cheeked Warbler, Setophaga chrysoparia, is a migratory songbird listed as endangered under the federal Endangered Species Act that breeds exclusively in central Texas and is heavily impacted by habitat conversion. The species relies on mixed Ashe-juniper and oak woodlands for nest-building and shelter during spring and early summer month...

Defenders of Wildlife and the National Wildlife Refuge Association pored over hundreds of federal documents—with a focus on refuge Comprehensive Conservation Plans (CCP)—to develop an up-to-date list of species found on or dependent on units of the National Wildlife Refuge System. The full dataset backing this report, as well as a copy of every CCP...

Addressing the current biodiversity crisis will require transformative changes to social, political and economic structures. One science-based recommendation is protecting at least 30% of Earth’s terrestrial and marine systems by 2030, a goal embraced by a global movement and popularized as “30x30.” Here we report the current spatial patterns o...

Aim The incorporation of functional and phylogenetic information is necessary to comprehensively characterize spatial patterns of biodiversity and to evaluate the relative importance of ecological and evolutionary mechanisms in molding such patterns. We evaluated the relative importance of mechanisms that shape passerine biodiversity along an exten...

Because biodiversity is increasingly threatened by habitat destruction and climate change, conservation agencies face challenges associated with an uncertain future. In addition to changes associated with climate and land use, parrots are threatened by hunting and capture for the pet trade, making them the most at-risk order of birds in the world....

We present a complete dataset from the literature on functional traits including morphological measurements, dietary information, foraging strategy, and foraging location for all 398 extant species of parrots. The morphological measurements include: mass, total length, wing chord, culmen length, tarsus length, and tail length. The diet data describ...

Adaptive management is a well-established approach to managing natural resources, but there is little evidence demonstrating effectiveness of adaptive management over traditional management techniques. Peer-reviewed literature attempts to draw conclusions about adaptive management effectiveness using social perceptions , but those studies are large...

Mechanisms underlying the ability of invasive exotic plant species (IES) to establish outside of their native ranges and outcompete native species (NS) are not yet fully understood, especially in low-resource environments. In deciduous forest understories, where light availability is low, but seasonally variable, one potential contributor to succes...

Mechanisms underlying the ability of invasive exotic plant species (IES) to establish outside of their native ranges and outcompete native species (NS) are not yet fully understood, especially in low-resource environments. In deciduous forest understories, where light availability is low, but seasonally variable, one potential contributor to succes...

Adaptive management (AM) is a systematic process for improving environmental management policies and practices in a way that incorporates uncertainty and learning. In the realm of natural resources, AM is increasingly being used by management agencies in the United States (e.g., U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Park Service) and non-...

Relationships among taxonomic, functional, and phylogenetic dimensions of biodiversity provide insight about the relative contributions of ecological and evolutionary processes in structuring local assemblages. We used data for rodent species distributions from an extensive tropical elevational gradient to 1) describe elevational gradients for each...

Temperate forests represent one of the major biomes on Earth. They are most common in eastern North America, western and central Europe, and northeastern Asia, where the climate is defi ned by warm summers, cold winters, and intermediate levels of precipitation. To a lesser extent, they are also present in this same climate in Australia, New Zealan...

Research concerning spatial dynamics of biodiversity generally has been limited to considerations of the taxonomic dimension, which is insensitive to interspecific variation in ecological or evolutionary characteristics that play important roles in species assembly and provide linkages to ecosystem services. Consequently, the assumption that the ta...

Background/Question/Methods Deepening our understanding of biological diversity requires consideration of taxonomic, functional, and phylogenetic dimensions to characterize the evolutionary and ecological variation represented by groups of species. Nonetheless, simultaneous considerations of multiple dimensions of biodiversity for multiple taxa a...

Invasion by nonnative species is considered one of the greatest threats to ecosystem structure and function worldwide. In the temperate forests of the northeastern United States invasive plant species frequently establish and colonize edge environments; however, they are not confined to these areas. In this study, I hypothesized that nonnative spec...

Natural disasters can cause extensive damage to communities and infrastructure. The state of Maine is fairly lucky, because natural disasters are relatively infrequent. Maine does, however, experience earthquakes, floods, hurricanes and landslides. Certain areas of the state are more prone to experience natural disasters than others. Using GIS anal...

The purpose of this map is to convey the extent of fragmentation in Maine’s forests. I chose this particular area to show the immediate effects of logging roads and clearcutting on a local scale. The data were used to focus on current, cleared, and regenerating forest locations as of 2005. A raster layer from the National Atlas database of National...