Abstract

GPS and GIS Workflow Improvements for Field Monitoring Efforts
Track: Environmental Management
Authors: Ingrid Hogle

The technologies used to map and monitor an invasive weed and its control have been streamlined significantly since the California Coastal Conservancy initiated the San Francisco Estuary Invasive Spartina Project (ISP) in 2000 to monitor and control invasive cordgrass (Spartina) in the regional marshes and mudflats. It took two biologists two years to complete the first inventory of Spartina in the Bay. We now employ a team of biologists who use GPS to annually map these invasive plants and to guide treatment at sites where patches are otherwise difficult to relocate. Our Monitoring Program has focused on streamlining our workflow, most notably through our transition to ArcPad for data collection and to a versioned ArcGIS workgroup geodatabase for data editing, to allow accurate data collection and fast turn-around time (which is now just 1-2 days/site).

Ingrid Hogle
Invasive Spartina Project
2560 9th St
Suite 216
Berkeley, California 94710
United States
Phone: 510-548-2461
Fax: 510-548-2460
E-mail: ibhogle@spartina.org