Week 7 - IntroGIS - Data Search

Map of Manatee County, FL, showing major cities and roads. DEP Quadrant 2920 (Southeast corner) is also highlighted. Projected in Albers Conical Equal Area. Source: FGDL, LABINS

Map of Manatee County, FL, showing species richness of strategic habitat conservation areas in relation to the elevation of the county. Includes a digital elevation model of the county obtained from the USGS. Projected in Albers Conical Equal Area. Source: FGDL, USGS

Map of Manatee County, FL, showing the wetland gradient across the county, and surface water. Categories of wetlands include flooding regularity, tidal frequency, among others. Map also shows elevation of the county, which affects wetlands type. Projected in Albers Conical Equal Area, with datum of GCS_North_American_1983_HARN. Source: FGDL, USGS.

This week we combined all of our new-found talents to do a data search for our own data, which we then put together. I really enjoyed looking at the different available data that is available to the public. We had a little bit of free-range with the data, as long as we included the major components.

I was assigned Manatee County, which allowed me to add in a cute little icon to my maps. For the strategic habitat conservation areas, I chose a raster data set for species richness because it ties into my other biogeography class. I did think the data provided was a little lacking in terms of distribution (there were only 6 categories), but this was a good start to such information.

Projecting the data into the same coordinate system was fairly easy since most of my data came from the same site (FGDL). All of the data is projected in Albers Conical Equal Area, with a datum of GCS_North_American_1983_HARN. For the rasters, though, it was a two-step process to reproject the data and a little more complicated, especially when trying to keep them straight in ArcCatalog.

I also enjoyed teaching myself the drawing tools when showcasing the DOQQ layer. I saw something similar in the examples provided, so did a Help Search to try to figure out how it was done. I know there is a lot to learn still with ArcGIS, and I can't wait to see what else we learn this semester.