Goodwin, B.J. 2007. The importance of movement behaviour in setting landscape connectivity. In R.G.H. Bunce, R.H.G. Jongman, L. Hojas & S. Weel (eds.), 25 years Landscape Ecology: Scientific Principles in Practice, Proceedings of the 7th IALE World Congress, 8-12 July, Wageningen, The Netherlands, pp. 327-328.

Interest in landscape connectivity has increased in the last decade. Despite the proliferation of landscape connectivity studies, few published papers have explored the how organism movement behavior impacts landscape connectivity. Many published papers equate landscape connectivity solely with measures of landscape structure and ignore the influence of movement behavior. To apply connectivity metrics judiciously, it is important to understand the influence of movement behavior on different connectivity metrics. I used an individual based, spatially explicit simulation model to explore how measures of connectivity respond to changes in movement behavior. Connectivity was measured as dispersal success, search time, landscape wide average habitat patch immigration rate, central habitat patch immigration rate, and landscape wide average habitat cell immigration rate. Landscapes consisted of habitat and two matrix patch types. I varied movement behavior (propensity to move, step lengths, turning angles, edge crossing behavior, perceptual range, conspecific attraction) in habitat and in one of the matrix patch types. By simulating the movements of individuals through landscapes I could determine the influences of movement behavior on connectivity. Results from the simulations illustrate how variation in movement behavior can dramatically impact measures of landscape connectivity. Furthermore, movement behavior in the matrix element had a stronger impact on connectivity than movement behavior in the habitat element. Finally, edge crossing behavior and perceptual ranges seemed to be the movement behaviors with the greatest impact on landscape connectivity. Based on these simulation results it seems prudent to consider movement behavior when determining landscape connectivity since connectivity measures based solely on landscape structure may be misleading. These results argue for more effort investigating organism movement in landscapes and, particularly, organism responses to edges and determinants of perceptual ranges.