Mapping Habitat Suitability For The Eastern Black Rail Throughout Its Atlantic Coastal Range Using Maximum Entropy (Maxent)

Modeling a species' distribution can be a powerful tool for predicting the location of additional habitat. Identifying suitable habitat is of critical importance for data-deficient species of conservation concern. The Black Rail (Laterallus jamaicensis), a small marsh bird, is listed as globally endangered. We created a habitat suitability model for the eastern subspecies focusing on the Atlantic coastal plain using eBird data contributed by citizen scientists and environmental data from the Esri databank using a maximum entropy model framework. The map generated from the model indicated habitat suitability in areas known for Black Rail occupation and predicted other suitable sites. Environmental factors that best predicted Black Rail presence were flooded areas with shrub and herbaceous vegetation, proximity to water, and flat plains. These environmental associations were congruent with characteristics of high marsh, emphasizing its importance for the species. Black Rails have been found to occupy this habitat type in the coastal part of their range. Habitat association studies conducted in other parts of the species' range that focused on smaller areas and used presence/ absence survey data collected via species-targeted callback surveys identified similar habitat characteristics. Our habitat suitability model thus adds to a growing list of studies using distribution data from public databases with significant power to predict occupancy over a landscape scale. The map generated by this model will inform land management decisions and habitat restoration efforts.