Just thought I'd pass along a useful new tool I came across the other day...

...the National Wetlands Inventory (as coordinated by the U.S. Fish &
Wildlife Service) now has their modeled wetland data in an easy to use
Google Earth format:

http://www.fws.gov/wetlands/data/googleearth.html

The value of this tool, as it relates to birding, goes without saying.  Its
value, as it relates to citizen science projects like the Ohio Breeding Bird
Atlas II and eBird, borders on the gargantuan.  Essentially, Google Earth (a
free Google application) eliminates the slop and clunk that was typically
associated with the wetlands-viewer applet on the NWI site.  Using Google
Earth, these data can be viewed in concert with other data, such as breeding
bird/marshbird survey routes.  OBBA2 survey block boundaries are now
available as a Google Earth layer (contact project coordinator, Matthew
Shumar <[log in to unmask]> for more details), and block boundaries
coupled with NWI data may reveal previously unknown emergent wetlands within
targeted atlas blocks.  The NWI data are broken into wetland classes, so you
not only get to visualize where emergent marsh is located, you also get to
visualize where forested or shrubland wetlands are located.  Finding a
quality forested wetland in an atlas block may add several new species to a
block list.  Finding a quality wetland of any kind right next to a road in
your block...priceless!

Scanning through satellite imagery on Google Earth may reveal the
occassional area that looks like it could contain marsh vegetation, but it's
not always completely obvious.  This is especially true of trying to
'eyeball' forested/shrubland wetlands.  The NWI data may not be entirely
accurate but doing a bit of ground-truthing should reveal surprising
results.

For those of you that are involved in eBirding county birding protocols,
narrowing down where there are easily accessible wetlands in a target county
may help to add useful wetland species data for that county.  On a recent
trip through Hillsdale County, Michigan (just north of Williams County,
Ohio), a scan of NWI data revealed some sizeable emergent wetlands along a
narrow township road.  Ground-truthing these locations revealed some very
impressive marshland that contained Least Bittern, Virginia Rail, Sandhill
Crane, Swamp Sparrow...Putting these locations on the map will enable other
birders to visit these possibly unknown locations who will continue to
provide useful avian data for these increasingly scarce ecosystems.

Good birding!

Aaron Boone
Plainfield, IL

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