Validating habitat suitability assessments with post-translocation animal movement data

Wildlife translocations are essential for restoring species to their native habitats, and species distribution models (SDMs) have proven useful for identifying suitable habitats to guide this process. Validating model predictions with data from individual's post-translocation, however, is rare due to the frequent lack of monitoring data from translocated individuals. The translocation of 14 Angolan giraffe (Giraffa giraffa angolensis) in 2023 to Iona National Park (NP), Angola, to restore its devastated fauna provided an opportunity to test the ability of SDMs to inform suitable habitat for translocation programs. Here, we describe the SDM we developed and implemented using Google Earth Engine (GEE) to inform the translocation process, combining Angolan giraffe movement data from 45 individuals from a population in northern Namibia with moderate resolution satellite imagery to predict suitable habitat throughout Iona NP. We then used telemetry data from the 14 translocated individuals to validate the results from the model prediction and to summarize their movements post-translocation. The mean predicted habitat suitability of pixels used by Angolan giraffe was significantly higher than that of random locations across the landscape. Translocated giraffe movements and home ranges were comparable to those of giraffe from other populations. They displaced at least 21.6 km from the translocation release site and remained within the park limits. Our study represents a truly independent validation of a habitat suitability model prediction, demonstrating that SDMs combined with moderate-resolution satellite data can play a critical role in informing wildlife translocations.