Hi Lui!

Your question is depending on various co-factors (such as how large is your study area, which kind of habitat-connectivity you want to measure (e.g. general quality of the landscape in respect of connectivity between pre-defined target classes; or detailed investigation of permeability for a certain target species...)...)

I could quickly recommend three tools: First one is fragstats - therin you´ll find various metrics to quantify landscape habitat connectivity on different spatial levels (patch, class, landscape) on a rather general level. If you further want to classify your study area into different subtypes of suitable corridors, branches, etc.. you could have a look at GUIDOS software.

If you want to conduct a rather in-depth /detailed analysis of habitat connectivity for a certain target species I´d go for CONEFOR or FunConn (if it fits to your research question).

All of the tools are freeware but most of them depending on a valid ArcGIS (at least ArcView, better ArcINFO) license.

Best, michael

A simple measure is using euclidean distance analysis http://webhelp.esri.com/arcgisdesktop/9.2/index.cfm?TopicName=Euclidean%20distance%20analysis%20sample%20applications This measures distances between patches of your chosen habitat. Alternatively, a more rigid approach is Cost-distance algorithm http://webhelp.esri.com/arcgisdesktop/9.2/index.cfm?TopicName=Cost_Distance_algorithm which allows you to weight habitats on the basis of the ability of your chosen species to travel through them. Both of these tools are available on ArcGIS.

Hope this helps.

Dear Colleague, I am working with CONEFOR, (http://www.conefor.org/) and i think it is the most complete software to analyze landscape connectivity because quantifies the importance of links and habitat areas and links responsible to keep or improvement of landscape connectivity, and it is also good tool to the prioritization of critical sites for ecological connectivity. If you work with the interface view it is user friendly, if you use the command line it is a little bit more complicated but not impossible. The only problem i had ii was when i have worked with a lot of patches.

Also IDRISI has a similar tool. It is located in "Land change modeler/biodiversity analysis section"

As already mentioned, it depends on what exactly it is you want to measure. That said, Fragstats is a good place to start and gives you an idea of the range of metrics which you could potentially use. Drawbacks are that it only works with rasters and that batch processing requires creation of separate rasters for each landscape. However, the documentation is good so I usually end up duplicating fragstats metrics in modelbuilder or python for use on feature data or to run them by zones on a single landscape raster. A large proportion of the metrics rely on parameters which are easily acquired using basic Arc tools (e.g. patch area, distance between patches, number of patches), which can then be plugged into whichever metric you choose in a (relatively!) simple script/model.

Have you tried circuitscape? It is more realistic than ARC GIS least cost path.

Best,

Gui

Hi Lui,

I also tried:

- HCA toolkit: http://waconnected.org/habitat-connectivity-mapping-tools/

- Functional linkage index tool: https://www.google.de/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CC0QFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dtic.mil%2Fcgi-bin%2FGetTRDoc%3FAD%3DADA489178&ei=M3eDUvWDFJHDswb18YCQAg&usg=AFQjCNG9sxekbKEHJTZu2Ul18m4OAuLStQ&sig2=ZbqhHUTZgpLpMuDJNdy-Rw&bvm=bv.56343320,d.Yms

- MatrixGreen: http://www.stockholmresilience.org/21/research/modelling-and-visualisation-lab/matrixgreen.html

Of course you have to check whether they are valid for the purpose of your analyses.

We used GUIDOS (Conefor) for an application in SE of Spain: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1617138112000647

Best,

Maria

I bet for fragstats, free & helpful.

Fragstats provides several connectivity metrics at patch, class, and landscape levels. Depending on your purpose, you might select 2 or 3 metrics from them.

I worked with Conefor Sensinode, it was good. I found it suitable for landscape to regional scale.

Hi, I tinck there are a lot of tools you can do the same. The important thing is to know very well what you need, define the correct variables to calculate the friction (or connectivity or....), species or habitats you need to connect, etc etc. There is a a very usefull web: http://corridordesign.org/ with information and tools.

Two general options would be "network analyst" extension + "Urban Network Analysis" by MIT:

http://cityform.mit.edu/projects/urban-network-analysis.html

http://www.esri.com/software/arcgis/extensions/networkanalyst

However, we think the more dedicated tool for this request will be :

http://www.nrel.colostate.edu/projects/starmap/funconn_index.htm

(BTW; all kinds of –mostly freeware- GIS tools can be downloaded here: )

http://corridordesign.org/designing_corridors/resources/gis_tools

good luck,

Prof. Arjan van Timmeren, PhD MSc

Chair of Environmental Technology & Design

Department of Urbanism

TU Delft | Faculty of Architecture

www.etd.bk.tudelft.nl

postal address: PO Box 5043, 2600 GA Delft, The Netherlands

visiting address: Gebouw 8, Julianalaan 134, Room 00.West.800, 2628 BL Delft, The Netherlands

T: +31 (0)15 27 84991

M: +31 (0)6 39250977

e-mail: [email protected]

skype: A2quadraaT

U/ETD secretariat: Margo van der Helm

T: +31 (0)15 27 81298

mail: [email protected]

Fragstats is great if you want to calculate metrics such as edge density, patch size, aggregation index on your landscape, however if you want to model (predict) actual corridors of connectivity, then I really like Linkage Mapper (also free). It only needs 2 inputs, the polygons of areas to be connected and a resistance raster of your study area. It uses some of the Circuitscape procedures mentioned above, but is more user friendly and automates several steps that would otherwise be repetitive. Also, it has a users forum and the author, Brad McRae is very helpful.

ArcGis + Graphab. I'm not sure it's the best but it works

Yes...with fragstat you can build your own method depending on the required analyses. This software could also be useful for further analyses. It is interfaced with GRASS but you can work with all GIS files. For example I used it to calculate the shared borders betwwwn patches. It is very fast and easy to use

http://www.spatialecology.com/gme/

Hi Lui,

I've been doing connectivity modeling for about 12 years now and have a few opinions.

Each tool comes with its own assumptions (baggage) and benefits. I like the ones that integrate multiple tools, garnering the benefits of each and leaving the baggage behind, so to speak.

If your extent is smaller than all of Australia, I'd suggest the latest Linkage Mapper that includes Circuitscape http://code.google.com/p/linkage-mapper/ . This way, you get good looking, braided corridors, but also an indication of pinchpoints. If all of Australia, you might want to choose a tool that does not require you to choose core areas, like, the one Dave Theobald developed branded as Wild Lifelines by TWN: http://www.twp.org/what-we-do/scientific-approach/wild-lifelines

On the other hand, if you want to be on the cutting edge, I'm publishing a new algorithm that can be merged with current ones, and I'd be happy to introduce you to the tool and the other developers/testers.

Regards,

John

Gvsig anda QuantumGis, both linking GRASS and R tools to several free packages

Hi Lui,

There are many of them. Fragstats is probably one the most known and the community of user is quite big, and it is always good to know you have support. I must say that I like this software.

But you should consider other popular applications or extensions, with the previous cited :

For ArcGIS : LAMA(http://www.biolog-europe.org/lama.html), PatchAnalyst, LinkageMapper, V-Late.

Stand Alone app : Connectivity Analysis Toolkit (http://www.klamathconservation.org/science_blog/software/), Dinamica Project (http://www.csr.ufmg.br/dinamica/), IAN (http://forestandwildlifeecology.wisc.edu/staticsites/mladenofflab/Projects/IAN/index.htm)

You can also try R wich has several packages for connectivity purposes.

And check here : http://www.conservationcorridor.org/

I am a R user and was excited to be able to perform some of the connectivity analysis in R using the gdistance package. However our raster files were huge and we could not get it to work with anything else than the least cost distance. I am assuming this was a memory problem.

You might try looking at the simple tool described in InVEST: http://ncp-dev.stanford.edu/~dataportal/invest-releases/documentation/current_release/biodiversity.html

One that is very used in literature is www.conefor.org

Besides using one or two SW packages to estimate a set of metrics, you may find it useful to determine the closest fragment for every fragment you have (e.g. by using ARCGis) and then try to stratify these by a number of criteria (fragment size, shape, position in the area of study, etc) and make an exploratory analysis with the help of extensive visual checkings combined with fragment selection operations using those criteria (I'm not sure about the specificities of your study, but I find this approach rewarding when the area is large and I don't really have an overall, systematized vision of it; again, ARCGis fragment selection tools are a straighforward way to do this).

I would suggest FRAGSTATS.

http://www.umass.edu/landeco/research/fragstats/fragstats.html

http://wiki.landscapetoolbox.org/doku.php/tools:fragstats

It may be a good idea to review the work of Snatiago Saura where he looks at the behaviour of different connectivity metrics (see references at the end of message). I agree with John Gallo that diffenrent connectivity metrics have adavnatages and disadvantages and the choise will depend on the type of outputs and how you want to use to generate the corridors. Giorgio's idea is pretty good. visit the conefor website to see what has been done in terms of graph-theory based connectivity.

Thanks to all the contributions so far as there are a few tools that I was not aware of. I am looking forward to using them in the near future.

suggested references:

Pascual-Hortal, L. & Saura, S. (2006) Comparison and development of new graph-based landscape connectivity indices: towards the priorization of habitat patches and corridors for conservation. Landscape Ecology, 21, 959-967.

Saura, S. & Pascual-Hortal, L. (2007) A new habitat availability index to integrate connectivity in landscape conservation planning: Comparison with existing indices and application to a case study. Landscape and Urban Planning, 83, 91-103.

Depending on your data type I think you can also use FRAGSTATS

From my point of view, Fragstat is the better option. Following you can analyze the matrix obtained also in R, exploiting some powerful R packages (all free, of course!).

Furthermore, if you are an ArcGIS user, I remember a good extension for ArcGIS 9 (maybe is not compatible with 10) called V-LATE. V-LATE output are really interesting and useful: edge-density, several connectivity index, area-, form-, interior-, edge-, proximity-, diversity- and subdivision analysis.

Look at:

http://arcscripts.esri.com/details.asp?dbid=13898

But I think that ArcGIS provide also new and improved tools to calculate the "connectivity" on a landscape.

Good work!

In our work we calculated a connectivity-index for landscape elements with ArcGis and fragstats. It worked quite well. For details see: A. Frey-Ehrenbold et al. (2013) Landscape connectivity, habitat structure and activity of bat guilds in farmland-dominated matrices. Journal of Applied Ecology, 50, 252-261.

First of all you should distinguish between fragmentation and connectivity. Second, you should distinguish between structural and functional connectivity.

For structural connectivity I used GUIDOS, it is very stable and can manage huge raster datasets.

http://forest.jrc.ec.europa.eu/download/software/guidos/

For functional connectivity I think the best option is still Conefor:

http://www.conefor.org/coneforsensinode.html

cheers

Do you know the tool developped by Eric Pante and colleagues ? It may be totally unsuitable for your needs. Just in case...marmap is an R package to get bathymetric and / or topographic data and use them to draw publication-quality maps. The most up-to-date versions of marmap and its documentation (including a tutorial in the form of an R vignette) is on CRAN (Comprehensive R Archive Network).

You can use Patch Analyst that can be used in ArcMap directly and different landscape metrics can be easily calculated. most of the metrics calculate connectivity indirectly. you can use Isolation metrics in Patch Analyst (like mean nearest neighbor distance). In addition, you can use FRAGSTATS software and calculate connectivity using direct metrics like patch cohesion.

Undoubtfully, the best GIS software for functional connectivity assessment is CONEFOR developed by Santiago Saura and frequently updated with the newest metrics and Indexes

Free access and use at http://www.conefor.org/coneforsensinode.html.

Best Regards

Hi I suggest FRAGSTATS and you can use Patch Analyst

http://www.cnfer.on.ca/SEP/patchanalyst/

One more proposition: CIRCUITSCAPE - I think it is better than least-cost path approach because it considers effects of all possible pathways across a landscape simultaneously (LCP assumes that the organism has a full knowledge about the landscape) http://www.circuitscape.org/

Before choosing any toos, you should make yourself clear on the purposes of your analysis.

The concept of ecological corridors based on the path-matrix-corridor landscape concepual model is being questioned in the ecological literature in the last years.

It is not possible to define (map) universal "corridors" which would be the dream of any planners...

Functional connectivty of fragmented habitat patches within a landscape should be modelled considerering individual species requrements at least in terms of habitat suitability and dispersal distances. Species mobility within the landscape my be different for the same species according to the phenological phase you are considering.

For these reason stand alone GIS tools are not the appropriate means to tackle this issue and you should look for more sophisticated tool (even the conefor is somewhat raw as it is based on euclidean distances) and comply with all software requirements looking at your target species also in terms of input map resoluton.

Hope this helps

I very much agree on this remark from Paola. You can only defiine corridors on the basis of ecosystems and species. A corridor for a (grassland) butterfly species can be a barrier for a strict forest bird.

Therefore corridors must be species and ecosystem based, and simple matrices with fragstats won't be very informative.

We use a metapopulation model LARCH-Ecoplanit, which defines corridors on the basis of a habitat analysis, taking into account species' potential for dispersal It can be downloaded from our website).

The LARCH model was used in many countries. To mention a few: Cheshire UK, the Meuse River, Rhine River, a stretch of the Vistula River (Poland), Pyrenees (Catalunya), in Italy Region Abruzzo, Emilia Romagna, Umbria, Sicily,further Lugansk Oblast (Ukraine), Pantanal (Brasil) and peatlands in Russia. Recently we evaluated the areas for the Birds Directive in Luxembourg, and we analysed the landscape connectivity for Ramat Hanadiv (Israel). (Many of these studies you can find under my publications).

Fragstats and similar tools like patch analyst can be interesting, but unless callibrated with 'real' species, they are of little value for defining corridors.

Our publication on 'European corridors, provides some good examples of corridors at this scale, and possible tools.

And the publication:

Book European corridors: strategies for corridor development for ...

And website (enlgish)

http://www.wageningenur.nl/nl/Expertises-Dienstverlening/Onderzoeksinstituten/alterra/Faciliteiten-Producten/Software/LARCH.htm

This is just to add an important point to the comment by Paola, which otherwise I agree with, and to complement previous contributions to this question.

Conefor is not based in Euclidean distances but open to any form of distance measure that may be relevant in each particular application, such as effective distances from least-cost paths, effective resistances from circuit theory or others (for example, even genetic distances could be used). To see the variety of distance measures that have been used with Conefor you can have a look at http://www.conefor.org/applications.html.

Assuming that, among all possible options, you may want to use the popular least-cost effective distances for a given species, some of the many examples of Conefor being used with such effective distances can be found in the following publications:

- Trainor, A.M., Walters, J.R., Urban, D.L., Moody, A. 2013. Evaluating the effectiveness of a Safe Harbor Program for connecting wildlife populations. Animal Conservation. doi: 10.1111/acv.12035.

- Decout, S., Manel, S., Miaud, C., Luque, S. 2012. Integrative approach for landscape-based graph connectivity analysis: a case study with the common frog (Rana temporaria) in human-dominated landscapes. Landscape Ecology 27: 267-279.

- Carranza, M.L., D'Alessandro, E., Saura, S., Loy, A. 2012. Connectivity providers for semi-aquatic vertebrates: the case of the endangered otter in Italy. Landscape Ecology 27: 281-290.

- Gurrutxaga, M., Rubio, L., Saura S. 2011. Key connectors in protected area networks and the impact of highways: a transnational case study from the Cantabrian Range to the Western Alps. Landscape and Urban Planning 101: 310-320.

- Fu, W., Liu, S., DeGloria, S.D., Dong, S., Beazley, R. 2010. Characterizing the "fragmentation-barrier" effect of road networks on landscape connectivity: a case study in Xishuangbanna, Southwest China. Landscape and Urban Planning 83: 91-103.

In many cases you would use Conefor in combination with other software tools that calculate such least-cost effective distances or some other form of distance. The Conefor Inputs extension for ArcGIS only calculates Euclidean distances, but this not the only option and of course is not always the best option. Some of the other software packages or GIS extensions that calculate these effective distances (or resistances) in a format that can be readily used as an input for Conefor are the following (this is not an exhaustive list):

- Linkage Mapper: https://code.google.com/p/linkage-mapper/

- PathMatrix: http://cmpg.unibe.ch/software/pathmatrix/

- Circuitscape: http://www.circuitscape.org/

Conefor will not calculate any type of distance among patches for you (you will have to do this externally to Conefor), but can take any type of distance among patches as an input and calculate the habitat connectivity in the landscape, its changes, and the individual elements (patches or linkages) that most contribute to conserve connectivity (or that would contribute most to restore it).

Thank you Santiago for the updates about Conefor.

A similar thread, for those who are not aware of it:

https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_the_most_recent_and_comprehensive_index_or_list_of_landscape_metrics?cp=re65_x_p2&ch=reg&loginT=ioZ1SObJBtyA0NgMkudh-2WFYbAGBAx41JRcQBDSc34%2C&pli=1#view=528b4dccd11b8b73688b4661

Hi Lui,

You may be interested to look at theSpatial Links Tool that I have developed with collegues in NSW OEH.

Drielsma, M. J., G. Manion, and S. Ferrier. 2007. The Spatial Links Tool: Automated mapping of habitat linkages in variegated landscapes. Ecological Modelling 200:403-411.

I also have a manuscript near completion for a multi-scale application of the tool that we used for the consolidate layer in:

Drielsma, M. J., G. Howling, and J. Love 2013. NSW Native Vegetation Management Benefits Analyses - technical report. Office of Environment and Heritage (NSW), Sydney. http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/biodiversity/nswbiostrategy.htm

and

Lentini, P., P. Gibbons, J. Carwardine, J. Fischer, M. Drielsma, and T. Martin. 2013. The effect of planning for connectivity on linear reserve networks. Conservation Biology.

Give me a call on +61 2 67734524 if you want to discuss

Hello, I think this article would be useful to you.

- Marulli, J., & Mallarach, J. M. (2005). A GIS methodology for assessing ecological connectivity: application to the Barcelona Metropolitan Area. Landscape and Urban Planning, 71(2), 243-262.

The real question to me is not what is the best GIS tool to calculate habitat connectivity in the landscape, but rather which kind of connectivity we are going to measure. An accepted goal of conservation is to build a conservation network that is resilient to fragmentation and environmental change. However, fragmentation is a relative concept as well as connectivity. Effective corridors should provide suitable and reliable connectivity among habitats across scales for species mobile or less mobile for gene exchange under uncertainty and change. However, often a "static" vision of landscapes is adopted (i.e. the cartography of land uses/covers) whereas landscapes (habitats included) are dynamic. Indeed, they do change either under different seasonal conditions, or under multiple driving forces like, for instance, climate change. As a result, what we are looking for, i.e. fragmentation or effective corridors, can systematically change on the map, and what is fragmented or suitable as corridor under certain conditions could not be suitable or fragmented when season, conditions or the set of focal species are changed. Just because we are not so good in predicting the future and what could be a suitable network sustaining biological diversity and gene exchange, we have to rely on past time series (at a suitable scale) to define the trajectory of every landscape piece to see whether it is predictable or not, that is, if it is persistent or not. Once you get a "predictability" map then you can think of applying different modelling tools to derive, under uncertainty; what possibly could be an effective corridor network and a suitable fragmentation for the future. So you could discover that along with "classical" green and blue ways other elements in the landscape could be crucial for the network based on their predictability. You could also discover which unpredictable landscape pieces are crucial for the maintenance of the overall connectivity in the face of climate change and try to transform them in "persistent" through planning and management efforts. See, for instance, the paper "Highlighting order and disorder in social–ecological landscapes to foster adaptive capacity and sustainability" recently appeared in Landscape Ecology. The same principle should be applied to fragmentation/connectivity for marine systems (see Modeling population connectivity by ocean currents, a graph-theoretic approach for marine conservation appeared in Landscape Ecology). Indeed, for many marine species, population connectivity is determined largely by ocean currents transporting larvae and juveniles between distant patches of suitable habitat. So, connectivity relies on the persistence of ocean currents suggesting areas that might be prioritized for marine conservation efforts and that are working like "stepping stones" in the maintenance of the overall network. On the other hand, you might identify "new" candidate stepping stone areas in case of predicted changes in the oceanic current pattern due to climate change. Unfortunately most of marine biologists and ecologists involved in marine conservation do not consider the importance of ocean currents.

Hi. Another way to deal with the connectivity is through the spatial animal use using spatial capture-recapture. I suggest you to try the R code:

http://www.esapubs.org/archive/ecol/E094/022/default.php

The original article:Spatial capture–recapture models for jointly estimating population density and landscape connectivity. Ecology 94:287–294:

http://www.esajournals.org/doi/abs/10.1890/12-0413.1

Regards,

Jose

May be maxent

Well, you can "create" with common GIS software an habitat connectivity analysis. Here an example.

Article Spatial analysis of selected biodiversity features in protec...

Hi, I use ArcGIs. The tools employed are the coherence index and the index of fragmentation of habitat by Jaeger (enclosed). In fact the last index measure the degree of landscape division. The coherence index measure "the probability that two animals placed in different areas somewhere in the region of investigation might find each other". I design a polygon file with the option "buffer"  to calculate area and length of each fragment and with these data are obtained the results of the mentioned indices.

Greetings,

Jose.

Marxan is a good software too

http://marxan.net/

Jose Pizarro - How do you measure effective mesh size in ArcGIS?

Hi Liu

I used FRAGSTATS. Its a small,simple yet powerful standalone software that commutes landscape fragmentation and connectivity metrics efficiently. You can even set it to commute the metrics at different levels organisation from habitat to landscape level.

http://www.umass.edu/landeco/research/fragstats/fragstats.html 

Hi..i use Circuitscape.. feel free to read my paper 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5486437/

As mentioned above by Amal, Circuitscape is an increasingly common tool for identifying movement corridors for multiple species, and one which my research group has used with success.  It operates similar to a least cost path analysis, but instead of identifying single thin corridors, it calculates usage across entire landscape.  This has been used on very large scales (Province of Ontario; A2A initiatives) as well as recently on small scales (we recently published on this; see below).  It operates effectively with simple resistances (i.e. not complex differentiation between similar habitats, but rather as simple as good, medium and bad have been shown to provide reliable estimates of road crossing and occupancy for mammals and herpetofauna). Here are some useful links:

http://www.circuitscape.org/

McCrae, B. et al. 2008. Using circuit theory to model connectivity in ecology, evolution and conservation. Ecology. 89: 2712-2724.

Boyle et al. 2017. Comparison of road surveys and circuit theory to predict hotspot locations for implementing effective road-effect mitigation. Biodiversity and Conservation DOI 10.1007/s10531-017-1414-9.

Koen et al. 2014. Landscape connectivity for wildlife: development and validation of multispecies linkage maps. Methods in Ecology and Evolution. 5(7): 626-633.

Hope this helps!

Sean

I suggest you use the software you fill more comfortable with and fits your needs. Check for their characteristics, interoperability, support, simplicity e.g.

Enjoy

Definitely Fragstat. Quite simple, but powerful.

Or you can analyze the map in Guidos and then run the resulted map in Fragstat.

I have worked with FRAGSTATS. Small, simple, easy to install and program. It also generated a lot of landscape metrics that one can use to characterise landscape connectivity.

https://www.umass.edu/landeco/research/fragstats/fragstats.html

Hi, for my research, I need to measure habitat fragmentation that caused by highway and railroad systems, any idea how can I do that?

Thanks

Hi Behnoud,

The first step is to consider the various metrics with which you could test hypotheses about this. Specifically, habitat fragmentation itself is a state, which has detrimental effects on populations not an effect itself. Processes such as gene flow, dispersal and occupancy patterns etc, can be quantified and compared. It depends on what effects you are interested in, but using several of the tools above is a good way to apply these metrics to a landscape scale, both to visualize and identify changes or gaps in connectivity.

Cheers

Sean

Hi, Glad to know you all. I used conefor before, now I am using circuitscape and a method for multiple species could be modeled.

Hello dear, in my article is reported as follow. "Some GIS tools can be used for the creation of aecological corridors, including Least- cost paths, CorriDorDesign or Linkage Mapper tool implemented in ArcGIS (Hepcan et al. 2009; Gurrutxaga et al. 2010; Liang et al. 2018; Majka et al. 2007; McRae et al. 2008; McRae et al. 2016) or spatial pattern indices (e.g., the patch corridor model) developed for Fragstat (Kong et al. 2010; Vergnes et al. 2012)".

Here the link to publication

Article Geographical Relationship between Ungulates, Human Pressure ...

Hi Lui,

I recommend you to contact Prof. Jochen Jaeger. He would probably be of great help to you!

http://www.concordia.ca/artsci/geography-planning-environment/faculty.html?fpid=jochen-a-g-jaeger

User-friendly, not overly technical guidance using a couple approaches can be found here: Technical Report A training manual for habitat suitability and connectivity m...

Hi Lui Weber,

Various methods of analysis have been developed to detect the configurational properties of urban settlements. I use Space Syntaxe theory for that. Connectivity measures the number of spaces immediately connecting a space of origin.

Sources: Hillier, B. & Hanson, J. (1984), The Social Logic of Space, Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. pp.103

http://otp.spacesyntax.net/

Hi Lui,

As many others mentioned, FRAGSTATS is widely used tool in such studies.

Maybe in these technical reports you can find something useful as well:

http://www.iene.info/wp-content/uploads/COST341_Handbook.pdf

https://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/landscape-fragmentation-in-europe/download

The book from which this chapter was taken is also worth taking a look at: Chapter Landscape connectivity: A return to the basics

Regards,

Pedro A.

Sorry to be so late: try Lecos in QGIS (free access)

Best,

Guy

I have used fragstat. It is easy to use, however it is necessary to preprocess the raster file in ArcGIS / QGIS so that it can be processed by the program.

Does anybody have any advice on how to prepare my raster for use in FRAGSTATS? I cannot access an early version of ArcGIS as it only supports 10.0 or earlier. Any help would be massively appreciated!

Buffy Smith I was facing similar issues a few weeks ago.. Only managed to create valid input data for fragstats when preparing .tif images out of arcGIS Pro.. As you mentioned, Esri-Grid or other seemingly convenient formats didn´t work for me..

Be careful with NoData values when preparing the tifs.. However, fragstats documentation is extensive and prep-steps are well documented. Good luck!

Hi i advice you to use SAGA GIS tool there is a specific functions for ecology and landscape and there is one suitable for you... It's a free software and it's more powerful than ArGiS in computing... Then you may export your results and producing maps or doing other things on ArcGiS or better for me QGIS (because it's free!)

Hi Lui Weber,

with my regards, the linkagemapper(LM) is very suitable for analysis to the habitat connectivity.see it https://circuitscape.org/linkagemapper/linkage-mapper-tools/

And also, the LM is needed to associate with the circuitscape(CS) together.https://circuitscape.org/downloads/

Additionally, the pathmatrix could be available to compute the distance for the Least-Cost Path and Distance among different patches. http://cmpg.unibe.ch/software/pathmatrix/

Hope useful to your research.

Andrés Velástegui Montoya which preprocessing specifically?

Good question. A GIS is a family of software that allows us to visualize, store, manipulate, analyse and model spatial data (i.e. georeferenced data). Spatial data come in vector or raster format. Vector data include point data, lines, and polygons (e.g. coordinates, transect lines or habitat ranges, respectively;). Vector data are associated with additional data attributes, which provide additional information such as the number of individuals sampled at a point locality, the name of a river or a road displayed as a line, or the type of habitat represented by a polygon.