The State Wildlife Action Plan (SWAP) has several ways of indicating wildlife community condition in California. One is the number and distribution of threatened and endangered (T&E) species, number and distribution of endemic species, and vulnerability of species to climate change, land-use, and other threats.

Birds are a sensitive and visually-obvious indicator for landscape and habitat condition. Measuring distribution of different bird species can be a measure of ecosystem health.

Birds naturally vary in population size in an area. This could be due to condition variations in the area, or due to variations in some other area where the birds spend part of their time. Trends in population size of rare, listed, or common birds can provide important information about the habitat quality and biodiversity of a particular place or type of place.

The proportion of all wildlife and plants associate with forests that are in decline or at risk of decline is useful information in assessing habitat quality and other determinants of species' well-being in a region of interest.

This indicator will provide tabular and map information on the status of plant and animal species that are recognized by federal and state resource management agencies as at risk because of rarity or because other factors demonstrably make them very vulnerable to extinction. This indicator will provide the public with information by which to measure the state’s progress at both preventing and reversing an increase in the number of forest species at risk through time.

This indicator provides information on the number and status of forest-associated species at risk or in serious decline. As a result, these species may require specific action or intervention to ensure their survival. The number of species at risk and their status is a measure of the health of forest ecosystems and their ability to support species diversity.

This indicator provides information on the health of forest ecosystems through the number of native forest-associated species.Knowledge of the number of native forest-associated species highlights the importance of certain forest types in meeting conservation objectives and in understanding the relationships species have within ecosystems. The loss or addition of species in an ecosystem can provide valuable insights into the overall health and productivity of that system.

This indicator provides information on the population status of selected forest-associated species that are considered to reflect the genetic diversity present in forest ecosystems. Some forest species support or rely heavily on particular forest structures, patterns, associations and processes and can therefore be used to describe the status of genetic diversity in forests as a whole.

Diversity of species (commonly called biodiversity) refers to the number and variety of species in a local area (alpha diversity), among associated areas (beta diversity), or across a region (gamma diversity). There are different indices of diversity, which usually include the relative abundance of individuals within a species as part of the diversity calculation.

Genetic diversity means the diversity of genes and alleles particular to species and populations of species. Protecting ecosystem diversity and biodiversity can protect genetic diversity, but it depends on the degree of protection. Protecting a diverse and large number of representative habitats, populations, and individuals is most likely to conserve genetic diversity of species.