Doherty, K.E., Naugle, D.E. & Walker, B.L. Greater Sage-Grouse Nesting Habitat: The Importance of Managing at Multiple Scales. Journal of Wildlife Management 74, 1544-1553 (2010).

This paper looks at the differences in scale that affect habitat use in animals, and how this difference can be integrated into GIS.  Habitat can vary from a local scale to a landscape scale, and the whole gradient can influence where an animal will or can utilize space.  GIS is heavily relied upon when designing habitat models for myriad species and environments, but most often this considers only landscape scale vegetation patterns because of the extreme resolution required to extract local level vegetation characteristics from aerial photography or satellite imagery.  This study used field collected data to create local-scale habitat selection models as well as traditional landscape scale models and ground truthed their ability to predict breeding grounds for sage-grouse with the known locations in their study area.  They also created mixed scale models and these ended up being the best predictors of sage grouse nesting areas, proving that sage grouse use both fine and coarse scale landscape features to make decisions about where to nest.  This will allow management to more time and cost effectively select areas for reintroduction or habitat rehabilitation to increase sage-grouse nesting success.  This study was a good assessment of what people were not evaluating using GIS and how they can circumvent apparent stumbling blocks of GIS technology and produce more precise analyses.