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The Gap Analysis Program is a project of the Biological Resources Discipline of the U.S. Geological Survey. It is being implemented nationwide with the help of over 400 cooperating organizations, including the private sector, nonprofit groups, and other government agencies.
The Upper Midwest Gap Analysis Program (UMGAP) is a partnership designed to avoid duplicating efforts while meeting the diverse information needs of the participating state and federal cooperators. UMGAP is being coordinated by the U.S. Geological Survey Upper Midwest Environmental Sciences Center (UMESC), La Crosse, Wisconsin. Cooperative agreements are in place with the Departments of Natural Resources of Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin to develop current vegetation maps and public ownership and management maps. UMESC is also coordinating with GAP programs in neighboring states to ensure the development of regionally compatible information layers.
The conventional approach to maintaining biological diversity generally has been to proceed one species or one threat at a time. Gap analysis is a methodology to identify gaps in the representation of biodiversity in areas managed exclusively or primarily for the long-term maintenance of populations of native species and natural ecosystems. Gap analysis is conducted by overlaying vegetation and species richness maps with public ownership and management maps, so that gaps in the management of biodiversity can be identified. These data layers are developed, displayed, and analyzed using geographic information systems (GIS) techniques. The goal of gap analysis is to ensure that all ecosystems and areas rich in species diversity are adequately represented in the planning and management for biodiversity.
Satellite imagery from the Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) was delivered by the EROS Data Center (EDC) of the U.S. Geological Survey through the Multi-Resolution Land Characteristic (MRLC) Consortium program. These scenes were reviewed and archived by the UMESC before being forwarded to each state for computer-assisted processing and classification. Dr. Tom Lillesand, Director of the Environmental Remote Sensing Center, University of Wisconsin in Madison is Technical Coordinator of UMGAP. In conjunction with the GEO Services Division of the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, he has developed and evaluated a protocol for processing the Landsat TM satellite imagery.
The technical approaches being used follow:
1) Multidate imagery
2) GIS-assisted stratification into urban and nonurban and upland and lowland categories
3) An extendable classification scheme that can be cross-walked into other classification systems
4) Stratification into spectrally consistent geographic units based on ecoregion boundaries
5) Guided clustering techniques for classification of nonurban uplands and
6) Geographically stratified systematic sampling for collection of training and accuracy assessment data
U.S. Department of the Interior |
U.S. Geological Survey
URL: http://www.umesc.usgs.gov/umgap/overview.html
Page Contact Information: Contacting the Upper Midwest Environmental Sciences Center
Page Last Modified:
October 2, 2007
