This collection of conservation areas consists of the floodplain of the combined streams of the Iowa River and the Cedar River. The study area begins just southeast of Wapello, IA, and continues southeast until the Horseshoe Bend Division, Port Louisa NWR. The area is currently managed to maintain meadow or grassland habitat which requires intensive management due to vegetative succession. In addition, this floodplain area contains a high proportion of managed lands and private lands in the Wetland Reserve Program and is a high priority area for cooperative conservation actions. This project provides a late-summer baseline vegetation inventory to assess future management actions in an adaptive process. Changes in levees, in addition to increased water flows and flood events due to climate change and land use practices, make restoration of floodplain processes more complex. Predictive models could help determine more efficient and effective restoration and management techniques. Successful GIS tools developed for this project would be applicable to other floodplain refuges and conservation areas.

Crane Creek is a Great Lakes Restoration Initiative-funded coastal wetland restoration project that seeks to reconnect the diked coastal marsh to Crane Creek and improve water quality and fish habitat. Vegetation sampling data and previously completed vegetation maps exist for this study area and will be used to assist in the interpretation of the 2014 imagery.

Crane Creek is a Great Lakes Restoration Initiative-funded coastal wetland restoration project that seeks to reconnect the diked coastal marsh to Crane Creek and improve water quality and fish habitat. Vegetation sampling data and previously completed vegetation maps exist for this study area and will be used to assist in the interpretation of the 2014 imagery.

This hydrologic and landscape database was developed by the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for the Clarks River National Wildlife Refuge and contributing watersheds in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Mississippi. The database was developed as an assessment and evaluation tool to use in examining refuge-specific hydrologic patterns and trends as related to water availability and water quality for refuge ecosystems, habits, and target species. The database includes hydrologic time series data, statistics on landscape and hydrologic time series data, and hydro-ecological metrics that can be used to assess refuge hydrologic conditions. The database is described in detail in Open File Report 2017-1018.

This hydrologic and landscape database was developed by the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for the Clarks River National Wildlife Refuge and contributing watersheds in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Mississippi. The database was developed as an assessment and evaluation tool to use in examining refuge-specific hydrologic patterns and trends as related to water availability and water quality for refuge ecosystems, habits, and target species. The database includes hydrologic time series data, statistics on landscape and hydrologic time series data, and hydro-ecological metrics that can be used to assess refuge hydrologic conditions. The database is described in detail in Open File Report 2017-1018.

The Wetland Reserve Program (WRP) is a voluntary program administered by the NRCS. It provides technical and financial assistance to private landowners and Tribes to restore, protect, and enhance wetlands in exchange for retiring eligible land from agriculture. For a site to be a wetland eligible for restoration, it must be in a zone with sustained or frequent flooding for a period of 7 consecutive days on average at least once every 2 years (a value termed the 7MQ2). This study calculated the 7MQ2 flows for all the U.S. Geological Survey streamgages within the selected study reaches. These flows were related to the stage discharge tables for each streamgage and a corresponding elevation was determined. By use of the water-surface elevations (“inundation elevations”) along the rivers, an approximate extent of potential wetland for a restoration in agricultural land can be mapped. As part of the study, a set of maps representing the estimated potential wetland extents for each study reach was generated in a geographic information system (GIS) application by combining (1) a digital water-surface plane representing the surface of inundation elevation that sloped in the downstream direction of flow and (2) land-surface elevation data. The map products from this study will aid the NRCS and its partners with the onsite inundation-zone verification in agricultural land for a potential restoration.

The pre1939 shapefile displays the boundary between the floodplain and the uplands (a boundary that remains constant), while the 1939-2003 shapefiles (assicated with the geoTIFFs) display both the constant boundary between the floodplain and uplands and the changing boundary between the channel and the floodplain. The pre1939 shapefile is included to represent the floodplain formed before the earliest imagery in 1939. Both the flood plain and active channel of the river were delineated on the 1995 digital orthophoto quadrangles and overlaid on rectified photos. ArcGIS was used to draw the polygons that delineate the flood plain and active channel; the delineation was saved as a SHP file. There are no aerial images associated with the pre1939 shapefile.

The pre1939 shapefile displays the boundary between the floodplain and the uplands (a boundary that remains constant), while the 1939-2003 shapefiles (assicated with the geoTIFFs) display both the constant boundary between the floodplain and uplands and the changing boundary between the channel and the floodplain. The pre1939 shapefile is included to represent the floodplain formed before the earliest imagery in 1939. Both the flood plain and active channel of the river were delineated on the 1995 digital orthophoto quadrangles and overlaid on rectified photos. ArcGIS was used to draw the polygons that delineate the flood plain and active channel; the delineation was saved as a SHP file. There are no aerial images associated with the pre1939 shapefile.

This coverage contains land-cover information for all of Ohio and portions of Indiana, Michigan, Kentucky, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New York. This dataset was derived from the U.S. Geological Survey's National Land Cover Dataset (NLCD). NLCD raster grids were downloaded from the USGS EROS Data Center web server at http://landcover.usgs.gov/natllandcover.html, by state. These grids were then reprojected, mosaiced and clipped against a polygon coverage representing the study area. Grid cell resolution is approximately 30 meters or 1 arc-second.

This dataset consists of repeat vegetation cover maps of multiple Willamette River restoration sites where restoration activities were implemented to increase the area of floodplain forests. Beginning in the early 21st century, large-scale restoration programs have been implemented along the Willamette River, Oregon, to address historical losses of floodplain habitats for native fish (Keith and others, 2022). For much of the Willamette River floodplain, direct enhancement of floodplain habitats through restoration activities is needed because the underlying hydrologic, geomorphic, and vegetation processes that historically created and sustained complex floodplain habitats have been fundamentally altered by dam construction, bank protection, large wood removal, land conversion, and other influences (for example, Hulse and others, 2002; Wallick and others, 2013). Floodplain forest vegetation cover was derived from R Random Forest classification of 2009, 2011, 2018, and 2020 aerial imagery at three large-scale floodplain planting restoration sites along the Willamette River: Harkens Lake (river kilometer [RKM] 153-154.5), Snag Boat Bend (RKM 144-147), and Luckiamute State Natural Area (RKM 108-111). The overall goals and approaches for the repeat mapping are based on a previously published effectiveness monitoring framework for Willamette River restoration activities (Keith and others, 2022). The repeat mapping datasets include GIS layers defining two classes of vegetation cover (forest and not-forest, condensed from six cover classes: forest, not-forest (agriculture), not-forest (other), water, shadow in forest, and shadow in non-forested areas). This mapping can be used to support an assessment of changes to floodplain forest vegetation cover at sites along the Willamette River floodplain where restoration activities were implemented from 2012 to 2020 to increase the area of native floodplain forest vegetation.