All Taxa Biotic Inventories and the NPS
Cobb, Neil, 1, Elaine Leslie 2
1
Northern Arizona University, PO Box 5765, Flagstaff, AZ 86011,
Resources Division, Ft. Collins, CO. elaine_leslie@nps.gov,
peter_dratch@nps.gov
2Biological
Biodiversity as a resource that needs to be managed and conserved has not received much
attention at the national level. However, national parks may be responsible for becoming
critical preserves of biodiversity in the face of increasing global change threats. However,
we cannot manage for biodiversity resources if we do not know they exist. The NPS
ATBI program is the first comprehensive inventory of its kind; the NPS is assuming a
national leadership role in biodiversity conservation by documenting and managing for
biodiversity in the face of global change. The success of this program will involve the
incorporation of species information into management plans that protect biodiversity of
national parks. A major challenge in this endeavor will be determining what species are
present in national parks and where they occur.
An integrated approach combining traditional inventory methods of observation and
collection of whole-organism with molecular techniques and species occurrence
modeling will be vital to the success of this program, and the conservation of biodiversity
in national parks. Details of the Centennial Challenge and other ATBI and Bioblitz
efforts and the role of NPS will be discussed.