Abstract: Habitat restoration for wildlife and recovery of extremely small populations are crucial measures for enhancing biodiversity and integral components of ecological civilization construction. Identifying potential ecological spaces as wildlife habitats and initiating habitat restoration projects represent effective strategies to adapt wildlife conservation management to the new era. There are many difficulties in site selection and inadequate integration of project areas with urban ecological spatial planning in the wildlife habitat construction projects promoted by the Shanghai Forestry Bureau. Taking the Eurasian badger (Meles meles) as an example, analyzing data from the Third National Land Use Survey, and fully avoiding urban development boundaries and permanently protected basic farmland, this study closely aligned with the “Special Planning of Shanghai Ecological Space” and the “Planning of Shanghai Basic Ecological Network”. We further took into account the integrated and optimized scope of nature reserves and potential afforestation spaces to delineate the priority ecological space for selecting wildlife habitat restoration projects in Shanghai. Using identification strategies based on key indicators such as landscape characteristics, human disturbance, and ecological location, we innovatively developed a method for rapidly screening and establishing a project reserve database for wildlife habitat restoration in highly urbanized areas. The results showed that the priority ecological space for selecting wildlife habitat restoration projects in Shanghai covered a total area of 3388.7925 km², encompassing various land use types such as cultivated land, gardens, forests, grasslands, wetlands, and water areas. Based on the rapid screening method, we identified eight spaces for Meles meles habitat restoration projects, located in Changxing Island of Chongming, Zhujiajiao of Qingpu, Jinhui of Fengxian, Xinchang of Pudong, Lvxiang of Jinshan, Guangfulin of Songjiang, Waigang of Jiading, and Shenya of Fengxian. These results provide robust scientific support for key decisions regarding the selection, quantity, and spatial configuration of habitat protection and restoration projects under the context of urbanization. This study offers significant insights for guiding ecological protection practices in future urban construction and management.

Key words: habitat restoration, identification criteria, ArcGIS, spatial analysis, Meles meles