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Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment Tool for Coastal Habitats Guidance Document

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As the climate shifts, coastal habitats face a number of threats—changes in precipitation patterns, higher temperatures, rising seas, and invasive species. Land managers and decision makers need to know which habitat types are most vulnerable to these changes in order to prioritize their actions. Several reserves collaborated to develop the Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment Tool for Coastal Habitats ("CCVATCH"). The tool helps decision makers evaluate a habitat ’s vulnerability to climate change and prioritize it for conservation or restoration. South Carolina ’s North Inlet-Winyah Bay Reserve and the Chesapeake Bay Virginia Reserve worked with local partners on a 2013 Collaborative Research project to refine and pilot this tool and share it with the national reserve system.