Under this FY13 Great Northern LCC Funding Guidance, the US Fish and Wildlife Service Mountain-Prairie Region (FWS R6) is requesting project proposals for landscape related science and information that address one of the following Science Needs described below. In support of the Great Northern LCC and consistent with Secretarial Order 3289 and other LCC guidance, awards issued pursuant to this announcement will be expected to result in various products or outcomes. Details describing data and deliverable product expectations can be found GNLCC Information Management, Delivery, and Sharing Standards(http://greatnorthernlcc.org/sites/default/files/documents/gnlcc_datamgt_sharing_polic y_fy13_11-26-12.pdf). FWS R6 reserves the right to make no awards under this announcement. Funding amounts among these needs are not explicit; final amount awarded within each theme is at discretion of the GNLCC Steering Committee and FWS R6. Applicants are required to categorize each of their submissions into one of the ecotypic areas and conservation goals described in the Strategic Conservation Framework, and summarized below (proposals may encompass >1 ecotypic area and goal). Submissions will be evaluated with other proposals under similar ecotypes/goals using the general criteria and relevance criteria. Section V. (page 6) of the attached guidance identifies general and relevance criteria applicable to all submissions within the context of the GNLCC Strategic Conservation Framework as it is summarized here: GNLCC seeks specifically identified data and information needs and resource vulnerability assessments that contribute to collective understanding of the effects of priority landscape stressors (invasive species, land use change including energy development, and climate change) on priority conservation targets including ecosystems, ecosystem processes, and species (see below). Specifically, information obtained through this funding guidance should help GNLCC achieve our four stated conservation goals: 1. Maintain large, intact landscapes of naturally functioning terrestrial and aquatic community assemblages. 2. Conserve a permeable landscape with connectivity across aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, including species movement, migration, dispersal, life history, and biophysical processes. 3. Conserve a permeable landscape with connectivity across aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, including species movement, migration, dispersal, life history, and biophysical processes. Ecotypic Areas: The Strategic Conservation Framework identifies three ecotypic areas that cover large expanses within GNLCC, have similar ecological systems with relatively consistent species compositions and configurations, and are facing common conservation issues. The Columbia Basin, Rocky Mountain, and Sagebrush Steppe were identified and prioritized in the Framework to connect local landscape partnerships working on similar conservation issues and broaden their positive affects to larger landscape scales. Proposal must identify which of these areas their science will affect. See Framework: (http://greatnorthernlcc.org/sites/default/files/documents/gnlcc_strategic_framework_august_2012.pdf) page 10 for details on these areas.