Presentations from the
8th Annual Meeting of the Organization of
Fish and Wildlife Information Managers
Rapid City, South Dakota
September 25th-29th, 2003

SESSION 2 - Morning Presentations
Friday - September 26, 2003

• Mapping and Ranking Conservation Opportunity Areas for the Lower Midwest Using GIS (David Diamond, C. Diane True, Taisia M. Gordon and Walter E. Foster)
• Using GIS to Develop a Conservation Plan for the Central Hardwoods Bird Conservation Region (C. Diane True and Jane Fitzgerald)
• The Role of GAP Data and GIS Modeling Techniques in Developing a Comprehensive Plan for State and Tribal Wildlife Grants (M. Keith Wethington) 
• Development of a Multi-level Aquatic Habitat Classification in Virginia and Its Use in Aquatic GAP and Conservation Planning (Shelly Miller)
• Retrieving Little Tennessee Data for Conservation Use (Shelaine Curd-Hetrick)
  
• SESSION 1 - Morning OFWIM 2003 Presentations - Morning Session - Thursday - September 25th
  
• SESSION 1 - Afternoon OFWIM 2003 Presentations - Afternoon Session - Thursday - September 25th
  
• SESSION 2 - Afternoon OFWIM 2003 Presentations - Afternoon Session - Friday - September 26th
  
• SESSION 3 - Morning OFWIM 2003 Prestentations - Morning Session - Sunday - September 28th
  
• SESSION 3 - Afternoon OFWIm 2003 Presentations - Afternoon Session - Sunday - September 28th

Mapping and Ranking Conservation Opportunity Areas for the Lower Midwest Using GIS  (David Diamond, C. Diane True, Taisla M. Gordon and Walter E. Foster)

We used GIS to identify conservation opportunity areas (OAs) for the lower Midwest (IA, KS, MO, NE) using land cover and roads data. OAs are areas of natural and semi-natural vegetation that are away from roads and away from habitat patch edges. We ranked OA polygons for importance in several ecoregions of the northeastern Ozark Highlands using five different conservation targets including patch size, landform representation (from digital elevation model-derived landforms), total vertebrate diversity (from Gap Analysis data), target bird diversity (from Missouri Breeding Bird Atlas data), and target land cover type (from a detailed, satellite-derived land cover classification). We selected top priority OAs for each target until a threshold of 25% of the study area was represented. Perceived top priorities by conservation target generally do not overlap more than would be expected at random. Only 1.6% of the study area was selected as high priority by all five targets. Thus, perceived priorities depend on the conservation target of concern, and few areas are high priority for many targets. Workers should carefully evaluate priority targets for assessments, and may not want to rely on GIS assessments that simply 'stack' results from many separate analyses.

Using GIS to Develop a Conservation Plan for the Central Hardwoods Bird Conservation Region (C. Diane True and Jane Fitzgerald)

The Central Hardwoods Bird Conservation Region (BCR) straddles the Mississippi River between Illinois and Missouri. Although the native ecosystems have largely been lost or are now severely degraded, the BCR's priority bird species can be grouped into species suites affiliated with four general habitat types: grassland, grass-shrubland, woodland-forest, and wetlands.

One step of many in the process of planning for bird conservation requires the identification of specific areas where the region's priority bird species can receive conservation attention in a coordinated and focused manner. Without a geographic focus, conservation efforts would be more likely to proceed in a ?shotgun? fashion, and the dilution of effort could render actions undertaken and money spent ineffective and insufficient to achieve conservation goals. There was, therefore, a need to find the best places to protect or restore grassland, grass-shrubland, forest and wetland ecosystems where conservation work would have the greatest chance of success.

This presentation available as:
PowerPoint presentation: (True_OFWIM_2003.ppt): http://www.ofwim.org/docs/2003/PPT/True_OFWIM_2003.ppt
Adobe Acrobat Reader file: (True_OFWIM_2003.pdf): http://www.ofwim.org/docs/2003/PDF/True_OFWIM_2003.pdf

The Role of GAP Data and GIS Modeling Techniques in Developing a Comprehensive Plan for State and Tribal Wildlife Grants (M. Keith Wethington)

The State and Tribal Wildlife Grants (STWG) program has a long legislative history with the aim of making Federal funds available to state fish and wildlife agencies for conservation work. This legislative history includes initiatives such as Teaming with Wildlife, Conservation and Reinvestment Act, and the Wildlife Conservation and Restoration Program. In its present form STWG dollars are made available to the States based upon land area and population. The legislation directs that these appropriations be aimed at "species of greatest conservation need". In order to access STWG monies, the States must commit to developing a Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Plan. In Kentucky, GAP data products and GIS modeling have been essential components used to develop the Plan.

One goal of the Kentucky STWG Planning Team was to identify specific areas supporting animals in need of conservation. A species-weighting matrix was developed from NatureServe G and S ranks that allowed each species to be assigned a score reflective of rarity in Kentucky. GAP predicted animal distributions were used as one layer in our model to compensate for the lack of known occurrences. These animal distribution models were recoded, assigned a score from the weighting matrix, and summed using ESRI's Spatial Analyst extension. The resulting predicted animal rarity layer was used in conjunction with other datasets to begin the process of identifying discreet geographic units in need of conservation efforts.

This presentation available as:
PowerPoint presentation: (Wethington_OFWIM_2003.ppt): http://www.ofwim.org/docs/2003/PPT/Wethington_OFWIM_2003.ppt
Adobe Acrobat Reader file: (Wethington_OFWIM_2003.pdf): http://www.ofwim.org/docs/2003/PDF/Wethington_OFWIM_2003.pdf

Development of a Multi-level Aquatic Habitat Classification in Virginia and Its Use in Aquatic GAP and Conservation Planning (Shelly Miller)

The Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries recently completed a classification scheme for aquatic habitats in Virginia. The most general level of the classification is the ecological drainage unit. This level combines drainage and physiography to describe units with landscape, geological, and biogeographical similarities. The next focus of our efforts was the development of a stream reach classification using GIS data and tool sets. Our classification scheme incorporates concepts and techniques from the Aquatic Gap Analysis Program and The Nature Conservancy. The classification uses the USGS National Hydrography Dataset (NHD) at 1:100,000 scale. These data were modified and attributed with characteristics identified as biologically relevant by a team of regional experts. Attributes include size, connectivity, and gradient. These attributes were then grouped into classes and subsequently combined to create stream habitat types. More recently, we decided to delineate and to classify watersheds. Watersheds were delineated using hydrologic modeling tools and the National Elevation Dataset (NED). Watersheds were then attributed with data representing geology, wetland abundance, spring abundance, and several size and shape characteristics. These classifications provide valuable and much needed methods to catalog and to assess aquatic habitat abundance and distribution. These data will be used in Virginia's aquatic gap analysis to model species distributions and as a unit on which to assess habitat quality. They will also be used in the development of Virginia's Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Plan as descriptors of aquatic habitats and subsequently to assess rarity and quality of those habitats.

This presentation available as:
PowerPoint presentation: (Miller2_OFWIM_2003.ppt): http://www.ofwim.org/docs/2003/PPT/Miller2_OFWIM_2003.ppt
Adobe Acrobat Reader file: (Miller2_OFWIM_2003.pdf): http://www.ofwim.org/docs/2003/PDF/Miller2_OFWIM_2003.pdf

Retrieving Little Tennessee Watershed Data for Conservation Use (Shelaine Curd-Hetrick)

The National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII) www.nbii.gov is a broad, collaborative program to increase access to U.S. biological resources data and information. The NBII network has regional and thematic nodes including the Southern Appalachian Information Node (NBII-SAIN). SAIN encourages partnerships that improve information exchange for research, education, and environmental decision-making.

As part of that mission, SAIN and its partners identify data for retrieval and assist in making that data accessible to the user. The SAMAB (Southern Appalachian Man and the Biosphere) Appalachian Volunteer Environmental Monitoring (SAVEM) Project identified a continuing study on the Upper Little Tennessee River Watershed. The Little Tennessee Watershed Association (LTWA)'s Little Tennessee River Bio-monitoring Project data was collected and used to calculate an Index for Biotic Integrity (IBI).

An interactive map which shows (1) water quality from a biological perspective for stream stretches and (2) specific sampling points is currently available through the NBII-SAIN web site. Currently, an online input tool to enable direct user access is being developed to smoothly and efficiently continue this work.

The above was produced collaboratively by: Asociación ANAI (www.anaicr.org), Information International Associates (www.infointl.com), Little Tennessee Watershed Association (www.ltwa.org), NBII-SAIN (sain.nbii.gov), SAMAB (samab.org), Sunsite (sunsite.utk.edu), TVA (www.tva.gov), University of Tennessee (www.utk.edu).

This presentation available as:
PowerPoint presentation: (Curd-Hetrick_OFWIM_2003.ppt): http://www.ofwim.org/docs/2003/PPT/Curd-Hetrick_OFWIM_2003.ppt
Adobe Acrobat Reader file: (Curd-Hetrick_OFWIM_2003.pdf): http://www.ofwim.org/docs/2003/PDF/Curd-Hetrick_OFWIM_2003.pdf