Habitat Suitability Index Model for Breeding King Rail (Rallus elegans) in Rice Agriculture, in the Gulf Coast Joint Venture Region

We used a combination of remotely sensed habitat characteristics, previously determined by other investigators for predicting King Rail nesting propensity in rice, to create a habitat suitability index (HSI) for the major rice growing regions in coastal Texas and Louisiana. The HSI combines estimates of the maximum extent of rice agriculture at a 5 kilometer (km) scale, proportion of tree canopy at a 1 km scale, and ditch density at a 1 km scale. This HSI can be used to identify priority areas for maintaining, increasing, and enhancing rice agriculture in the King Rail’s range in coastal Texas and Louisiana, as well as a tool to rank proposals for conservation incentives available through the Farm Bill, or other funding sources. The final HSI was displayed with a 0 to 5 ranking (with 0 the least and 5 the most suitable), based on the natural breaks function in ArcGIS.