Designing Sustainable Landscapes: Representative Species Model: Black Bear (Ursus americanus)

Black bear was selected as a representative species for the Designing Sustainable Landscapes project of the North Atlantic LCC (https://scholarworks.umass.edu/designing_sustainable_landscapes/). The habitat clusters (ecological systems) and associated wildlife species that it represents generally comprise of wetlands, early successional forests and mature hard mast-producing forests. The Landscape Capability (LC) index only includes Habitat Capability for this species. Climate niche (CN) is not estimated for black bear because its suitable climate conditions encompass the majority of North America. Therefore, it is unlikely that the northeast will experience climate conditions outside of this range by 2080. Prevalence is also not used for black bear LC due its extensive range in North America and the lack of broad scale occupancy data.