Conservation Opportunity Areas

A key new enhancement to the 2025 SWAP is the introduction of Conservation Opportunity Areas (COAs) — spatially delineated zones where conservation or restoration is judged to have highest return.  The COAs refine habitat prioritization (mangroves, coral reefs, seagrass, ghuts, forest, etc.), emphasizing connectivity. In addition, by more explicitly tying SGCN's habitats to mapped opportunity areas and threat overlays, we will be able to more strategically allocation our limited resources. This is reflected in our prioritization of Conservation Actions, which are more closely tied to spatial Conservation Opportunity Areas (COAs), aligning high-leverage actions with the places where species live 

The COAs were developed through a partnership with SECAS (see partner collaboration page for more information on the partnership). The analysis drew from the Southeast Conservation Blueprint (2025) and the U.S. Virgin Islands Imperiled Terrestrial Species indicator.  The results of the COA analysis are classified into tiers of priority based on the potential habitat of SGCN and regional conservation priority. The top COA tier identifies potential habitat for one amphibian, one reptile, 18 birds, and two plant species and subspecies on the USVI SGCN list. Information for these species was provided by WildMon occupancy models for mapping species distributions across the U.S. Virgin Islands. The second and third tiers represent priorities from the Southeast Conservation Blueprint 2025 and its underlying connectivity analysis.

Including the Southeast Blueprint Caribbean Hubs and Corridors connectivity analysis helps ensure that the USVI COAs do not become isolated pockets of conservation but instead provide opportunities for species movement. Connectivity across COAs also offers opportunities for species to transition to other habitats and supporting resiliency to extreme events. This approach is consistent with methods used by other states, such as North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, which are also using the Blueprint connectivity analysis to inform their 2025 SWAP COAs.

Using additional Blueprint priority areas further augments areas identified as occupied by SGCN, ensuring better representation across multiple habitats, to achieve a balanced portfolio of COAs across the USVI’s land and waters, and to represent key areas that may have not been captured by WildMon’s acoustic monitoring.

Based on this analysis, roughly 52% of the lands and surrounding waters within the US Virgin Islands subregion (the subregion includes terrestrial and nearshore marine environment) are considered a COA. About 11% (26,955 acres) are considered Tier 1, 26% (65,041 acres) are considered Tier 2, and 16% (39,606 acres) are considered Tier 3.6