Introduction
Managing natural resources to benefit nature and people in an effective and cost-efficient way requires responding to changes that are occurring in the climate system. This guide, developed by Abigail Derby-Lewis from the Field Museum, Kim Hall from The Nature Conservancy, and Jessica Hellmann from the University of Notre Dame, represents a collaboration with resource managers in the Chicago Wilderness Region designed to help "jump-start" the process of updating our decision-making to account for changes in climate. This work builds upon many efforts led by the
Chicago Wilderness alliance to address climate change, including the Conservation Action Plan for Nature and recent updates to the Biodiversity Recovery Plan: Because rapid changes in climate threaten many of our ecological resources, especially in urban areas where natural systems already face many stressors, planning ahead to protect what we value is essential, yet challenging. This document, and a related discussion group and "workflow" in the
Climate Adaptation Collaboratory, are intended to be "living" documents that share approaches and key questions that partners within Chicago Wilderness can work through,
discuss, and update together to protect nature, and the people that depend on it, over the long term.