American badger - UCSB Species Distribution Model, CA Desert

These data are statistical model outputs for American badger (Taxidea taxus) species distribution, completed by Frank Davis’ Biogeography Lab at UC Santa Barbara.

The UCSB Biogeography Lab used Maxent to generate predictions of habitat occupancy for ~70 species for the CA Energy Commission’s project “Cumulative Biological Impacts Framework for Solar Energy in the CA Desert”, 500-10-021.

Species distribution models were produced at 270 m resolution using a subset of 22 environmental variables. Models were evaluated with 10-foldcross validated AUC scores. Results are preliminary and have notyet been reviewed by expert biologists.
Both continuous probability surfaces and binary layers are available for each species modeled. Binary layers depicting predicted suitable habitat were derived using the equal training sensitivity and specificity threshold.

For Taxidea taxus (broad extent), Max Sensitivity + Specificity threshold = 0.379; best AUC =0.921; mean AUC =0.867

For Taxidea taxus (narrow extent), Max Sensitivity + Specificity threshold = 0.385; best AUC =0.927; mean AUC =0.845

For more information on the modeling process and environmental variables used, please refer to the attached PDF file ("DATA DESCRIPTION: UCSB DRECP SPECIES DISTRIBUTION MODELS").