Director of Data Science
Technology
[email protected]
In The Nature Conservancy’s California Chapter, Kirk applies drones, big data, and other emerging technologies to address pressing environmental challenges in California. Kirk's recent work includes a project to estimate natural flows in rivers using machine learning , a web-app to monitor groundwater dependent ecosystems using remote sensing, and an annual survey to map kelp forests using drones. Kirk has authored 15 publications in peer-reviewed journals during his time at the Conservancy.
Before he joined the Conservancy, Kirk worked as an independent developer and an environmental consultant. He holds a B.A. in environmental studies and economics from Dartmouth College and M.A. in planning from the University of California, Berkeley.
What Kirk is working on now:
I am currently analyzing stream flow data to determine the best places to restore natural flows in California's rivers. I am leading an effort to develop a webmap to highlight locations where rivers and groundwater interact to provide cool consistent water to freshwater ecosystems. I am also using remote sensing and drone data to track changes in kelp forests over time.
Julie Zimmerman, Jennifer Carah, Kirk Klausmeyer, Gabe Rossi, Mia Van Docto, Jeanette Howard, Charlie Schneider, Matt Clifford, Monty Schmitt
Drought conditions are occurring with more frequency, greater severity, and longer duration under climate change. Human water use compounds the effects of drought, further stressing California’s ecosystems, impacting farms, rural communities and urban water supplies. The Salmon and Steelhead Coalition developed a Drought Flows Monitor…
Vienna R. Saccomanno, Tom Bell, Camille Pawlak, Charlotte K. Stanley, Katherine C. Cavanaugh, Rietta Hohman, Kirk R. Klausmeyer, Kyle Cavanaugh, Abby Nickels, Waz Hewerdine, Corey Garza, Gary Fleener, Mary Gleason
Kelp forests are complex underwater habitats that provide valuable services for both people and nature. Despite their importance, increasingly severe stressors have resulted in declines in kelp forests in many regions including the North Coast of California. Given the significant and sustained loss of kelp…
Melissa M. Rohde, Tanushree Biswas, Ian W. Housman, Leah S. Campbell, Kirk R. Klausmeyer, Jeanette Howard
Groundwater dependent ecosystems (GDEs) are increasingly threatened worldwide, but the shallow groundwater resources that they are reliant upon are seldom monitored. In this study, the researchers used satellite-based remote sensing, climate data, and machine learning to predict groundwater levels over a 35 year period (1985…
Melissa M. Rohde, Tanushree Biswas, Ian W. Housman, Leah S. Campbell, Kirk R. Klausmeyer, Jeanette Howard
Groundwater dependent ecosystems (GDEs) are critical habitats throughout California that rely on shallow groundwater. Unfortunately, only a small subset of wells provide monitoring data for shallow groundwater. This tool, developed for a publication in Frontiers in Earth Science, uses satellite data and machine learning tools to…
Julie K.H. Zimmerman, Daren M. Carlisle, Jason T. May, Kirk R. Klausmeyer, Theodore E. Grantham, Larry R. Brown, Jeanette K. Howard, Nathaniel Rindlaub, Falk Schuetzenmeister
Water is essential for California’s people, economy, and environment. Centuries of water management through dams and diversion have altered the flows in many streams and rivers, which can harm the freshwater ecosystems. The Nature Conservancy and the United States Geological Survey (USGS), and other partners…
Charlotte Stanley, Kirk Klausmeyer
This dataset categorizes the rivers and streams in the Central Valley on the likelihood that they are interconnected surface water (ISW) -- surface water hydraulically connected to groundwater. The dataset includes information on the average, maximum, and minimum depth to groundwater, using groundwater elevation…
Annalise Taylor, Tanushree Biswas, John M. Randall, Kirk Klausmeyer, Brian Cohen
In Western North America, droughts are expected to increase in frequency and intensity as the region’s climate changes. Over past decades, land managers on Santa Cruz Island, California witnessed mass mortality of conifer forest dominated by bishop pine (Pinus muricata). These pines play a key role within…
Kirk Klausmeyer, Falk Schuetzenmeister, Nathaniel Rindlaub, Tanushree Biswas, Melissa M. Rohde, Jeanette Howard
94,333 unique ecosystems depend on groundwater in California. GDE Pulse lets you see how they have changed over the last 30 years. Groundwater managers and environmental stakeholders often lack information about the health of critical groundwater dependent ecosystems (GDEs). To fill this information gap, we…
Walter N. Heady, Brian S. Cohen, Mary G. Gleason, Joshua N. Morris, Sarah G. Newkirk, Kirk R. Klausmeyer, Hilary R. Walecka, Elizabeth Gagneron
Sea level rise presents a new challenge to coastal conservation. The authors quantified and mapped the vulnerability of habitats, imperiled species, and conservation lands to sea level rise throughout the entire California coast, where high biodiversity, high endemism, and 26.5 million people coincide. Combining habitat…
Sandi Matsumoto, Gregg Werner, Melissa Rohde, Kirk Klausmeyer
Groundwater dependent ecosystems (GDEs) are plant and animal communities that require groundwater to meet some or all of their water needs. GDEs provide important benefits to California including habitat for animals, water supply, water purification, flood mitigation, erosion control, recreational opportunities and enjoyment of California’s…
Julie K H Zimmerman, Daren M. Carlisle, Jason T. May, Kirk R. Klausmeyer, Theodore E. Grantham, Larry R. Brown, Jeanette K. Howard
The importance of the natural flow regime to stream and river health has received growing attention in recent years. Understanding natural flows and patterns of flow alteration is an important first step in improving the management of California’s rivers and streams for human and ecosystem…
Serena Lomonico, Robert Jones, Torrey Johnson, Sarah Newkirk, Sarah Lummis, Kirk Klausmeyer, John Finger, Terry Sawyer, Richard James
Aquaculture is becoming an increasingly important global food source. With this growth comes urgent, unanswered questions about the interactions of aquaculture operations—both positive and negative—and ecosystems. This video describes a collaboration between the Conservancy, the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Hog Island Oyster Company aimed at…
Burns, C.E., A. Hoss, N. Smith, K. Klausmeyer, K. Fesenmeyer, A. Campbell, J. Carah, E. Forsburg, S. Heard, J.K. Howard, L. Hulette, S. Liu, P. Spraycar, B. Stranko, G. Werner, D. Wordham
This report identifies a set of strategies that will have the greatest impact on environmental flows, and to provide a resource for conservation organizations, resource agencies, and other stakeholders in California that may help create the conditions that allow freshwater species to thrive well into…
Kirk Klausmeyer, Jeanette Howard, Sandi Matsumoto, Sally Liu, Melissa Rohde
Groundwater is essential to the health and viability of plants, animals and ecosystems. Many tree species, like willows and cottonwoods, rely on groundwater to survive seasonal and annual dry spells. Fish and other aquatic life need groundwater to keep rivers flowing. When unsustainable management causes groundwater levels…
Megan Webb, Kirk Klausmeyer, Jeanette Howard
The transformation of California into one of the most productive agricultural and urban landscapes in the world and a growing population have put unprecedented pressure on freshwater habitats, reducing them to a small fraction of their historic extent. Across the state, freshwater-dependent ecosystems have been…
Jeanette K. Howard, Kirk R. Klausmeyer, Kurt A. Fesenmyer
California is one of the most productive agricultural and urban landscapes in the world with a growing population. These pressures have reduced aquatic and wetland habitats to a small fraction of their historic extent. Ecosystems dependent on freshwater have been degraded across the state, with…
Juliano Calil, Michael W. Beck, Mary Gleason, Matthew Merrifield, Kirk Klausmeyer, Sarah Newkirk
The U.S. National Flood Insurance Program has paid out more than $38 billion in claims since its inception in 1968, more than a third of which has gone to the 1% of policies that experienced multiple, repetitive losses. During the same period, the loss of…
Jeanette Howard, Kirk Klausmeyer, Kurt Fesenmyer
The California Freshwater Species Database is the first comprehensive geospatial database of California’s freshwater species compiled and standardized into single format from nearly 500 sources. It provides a single source for geodata covering the plants and animals that rely on California’s freshwater resources to survive.…
Jeanette K. Howard, Kirk R. Klausmeyer, Kurt A. Fesenmyer, Joseph Furnish, Thomas Gardali, Ted Grantham, Jacob V. E. Katz, Sarah Kupferberg, Patrick McIntyre, Peter B. Moyle, Peter R. Ode, Ryan Peek, Rebecca M. Quiñones, Andrew C. Rehn, Nick Santos, Steve Schoenig, Larry Serpa, Jackson D. Shedd, Joe Slusark, Joshua H. Viers, Amber Wright, Scott A. Morrison
The California Freshwater Species Database is the first comprehensive geospatial database of California’s freshwater species compiled and standardized into single format from nearly 500 sources. It provides a single source for geodata covering the plants and animals that rely on California’s freshwater resources to…
This webmap provides regional climate projections with information about topography, coastal proximity and level of habitat fragmentation to help land managers identify concrete conservation actions they can take now to help address the threat of climate change to the terrestrial species of California.
Klausmeyer, K, D. Cameron, S. Morrison
This study evaluated the existing network of conservation lands in California to determine the extent to which it includes landscape features that may be especially important for biodiversity conservation in the context of climate change. The authors found that past conservation action has created an…
Jeanette Howard, Kirk Klausmeyer, Kurt Fesenmyer
Californians face profound decisions regarding the management of their state’s increasingly limited water supply. Critical for decision-making is information about the plants and animals that also rely on California’s freshwater resources to survive. This report includes an atlas of the freshwater biodiversity patterns in California,…
M. Rebecca Shaw, Kirk Klausmeyer, D. Richard Cameron, Jason MacKenzie, Patrick Roehrdanz
Species will move around the landscape as the climate changes, presenting challenges for traditional conservation strategies like land acquisition. This paper models the cost and total land area that needs to be protected by 2100 to track the changing distribution of 11 focal species of…
Kirk Klausmeyer, Katie Fitzgerald
Key to protecting drinking water for all Californians is understanding the sources and health of the thier watersheds. This study maps California's surface drinking water sources, the watersheds that supply water to those sources, and the land protection status of those watershed lands. It includes…
Almost 9 million acres of California are at risk from flooding. These flood zones cover 16% of the state’s urban and suburban development, and 36% of the state’s land dedicated to cultivated crops. As the climate changes, flooding is likely to be more frequent and…
Shaw, M.R., L. Pendleton, D.R. Cameron, B. Morris, D. Bachelet, K. Klausmeyer, J. MacKenzie, D.R. Conklin, G.N. Bratman, J. Lenihan, E. Haunreiter, C. Daly, P.R. Roehrdanz
As the climate warms, changes in ecosystems will impact human communities and livelihoods. This paper, together with a California Energy Commission Scenarios Report of the same name, explores the broad impacts of climate change on ecosystem services and California’s economy. These publications help direct land…
Jeanette Howard, Kirk Klausmeyer, Sally Liu
This report analyzed Chinook, coho salmon, and steelhead trout population and habitat data across California to identify a portfolio of places called the SalmonScape. SalmonScape identifies areas in California with the greatest potential for habitat restoration and protection, and where wild salmon also have the best…
Megan Webb, Jeanette Howard , Kirk Klausmeyer, Sally Liu
The Conservancy's SalmonScape is an analysis and map that analyzed and ranked the watersheds that support or contribute to salmon habitat in California based on where conservation efforts would have the best return-on-investment. The analysis helped coordinate and direct salmon conservation efforts across the state.
Klausmeyer, K. R., M. R. Shaw, J.B. MacKenzie, D.R.Cameron
This analysis provides an approach for distilling complex climate and landscape data into actions land managers can take to help plants and animals adapt to a changing climate. Based on historical data, climate projections and landscape attributes like topography, coastal proximity and habitat fragmentation that…
Cameron, D., K. Klausmeyer, J. Mackenzie, G. Low, L. Provencher
Climate change will impact plants and animals across the state, and conservationists are often unaware of the best way to address this threat. While much of the land in the Northern Sierra is public and protected from development, it is still at risk to changes…
Kirk Klausmeyer, Dan Olstein, Terri Schulz, Robin Cox, Sasha Gennet, Jason MacKenzie
While the literature and guidance on traditional conservation planning methods is extensive, there are few case studies on methods for incorporating climate change into conservation planning efforts. This report outlines the methods the Conservancy used to develop strategies to help species adapt in the Mount…
Stralberg, D., D. Cameron, M. Reynolds, C. Hickey, K. Klausmeyer, S. Busby, L. Stenzel, W. Shuford, G. Page
This analysis provides the first comprehensive overview of the specific habitats used by 42 different migratory waterbird species throughout California. The authors reveal important gaps in protection for wintering habitat for shorebirds and waterfowl and highlight the importance of agricultural lands in migratory bird conservation. They advocate…
John M. Randall, Sophie S. Parker, James Moore, Brian Cohen, Laura Crane, Bill Christian, Dick Cameron, Jason B. Mackenzie, Kirk Klausmeyer, Scott Morrison
Regional conservation planning is critical to inform land and resource use decisions. The Mojave Desert Ecoregional Assessment represents an important advance in such planning, because of how its output characterized not just areas of high conservation value, but how conservation values distributed and graded across…
E.C. Underwood, J.H. Viers, K.R. Klausmeyer, R.L. Cox, M. R. Shaw
The mediterranean biome is one of the rarest terrestrial ecosystem types on Earth, restricted to only 2% of the world’s land surface. Encompassing portions of southern Australia, central Chile, South Africa’s Cape Region, the Mediterranean Basin, and California and Baja California, the biome is renowned…
Underwood, E.C., K.R. Klausmeyer, R.L. Cox, S.M. Busby, S.A. Morrison, M.R.Shaw
Mediterranean habitats are among the rarest on Earth. Characterized by warm dry summers and cool wet winters, they are restricted to only 2% of the Earth’s land surface–portions of southern Australia, Chile, South Africa, California and Baja California, and the Mediterranean Basin. Though small, these…