Document: LOU-3-64-23

Some lessons from the ATLSS project: modeling and Everglades restoration.

GROSS, L.J.* ¹ and D.L.DEANGELIS ²

University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, U.S.A. ¹
University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, U.S.A. ²

Abstract:
For much of the last decade, the ATLSS (Across Trophic Level System Simulation) project has been developing and applying a set of models designed to aid in restoration planning for South Florida. These make up a multimodel, consisting of a collection of submodels which utilize different mathematical and computational approaches in order to account for trophic components which operate at differing levels of spatial, temporal and biotic complexity. Developed in close collaboration with many field researchers with long experience in the Everglades, ATLSS has been extensively applied throughout the planning process and used in the evaluation of the biotic impacts of alternative hydrologic scenarios. We expect the process used for the development of ATLSS to be useful in similar efforts for regional environmental assessment. Developing succinct summaries of complex spatial model outputs in order to allow rapid analysis by field researchers of alternatives was essential. This led to the development of a relative assessment protocol in which all ATLSS outputs were compared to a base plan. Project managers could use this to develop a ranking of various alternative plans utilizing their own preferences for spatial regions to be considered. A uniform methodology across species and functional groups also allowed managers to apply their own criteria when accounting for differences in species responses between scenarios. The relative assessment approach has additional advantages in that the dependence of the rankings obtained on model assumptions can be explicitly tested. Though considerably more complex than aggregated spatial averages, spatially-explicit models evaluated through a relative assessment protocol provide details of trophic component responses that are essential for systems with explicit spatial controls.

Keywords: computational ecology, modeling, aquatic systems, Everglades

This abstract is being presented at: 5:00 PM in session:
Oral Session #46: Modeling Populations and Statistical Ecology.