Integrating land-use and climate connectivity to link protected areas at the country level

Context Ecological corridors that are high in biodiversity potential and stable under climate change are central to long-term conservation planning. Yet spatial prioritization frameworks rarely integrate land-use resistance and climate stability into a unified approach, limiting their operational value for landscape management and policy. Objectives We aimed to develop an ecological connectivity framework that jointly incorporates land-use resistance and climate stability to map linkages among protected areas, and to quantify and communicate methodological uncertainty arising from key parameterization choices. Methods We applied the framework to Portugal's terrestrial protected-area network. Using a full factorial design, we varied land-use resistance, climate resistance, and dispersal capacity across multiple weightings to generate optimized linkage solutions. Selection-frequency maps derived from these solutions fed a second optimization round, producing an ensemble connectivity solution and buffered corridors. Results Individual solutions covered 0.74% of Portugal's unprotected land; the ensemble covered 0.07%, rising to 2.3% after a 1 km buffer. Dispersal capacity parameterization introduced greater uncertainty in connectivity outcomes than land-use or climate resistance scores, suggesting it deserves particular attention in future studies. Protected areas in the Central–North region emerged as the most critical network hubs, with the highest centrality under both resistance gradients. The ensemble highlighted areas of high concordance across parameterizations, improving the robustness of spatial priorities. Conclusions Integrating land-use and climate resistance identifies corridors that are both functional and climate-resilient. Explicitly mapping uncertainty and producing ensemble-prioritized linkages improves the reliability of spatial recommendations, offering planners a practical tool for embedding connectivity targets into conservation and land management decisions.