Virginia
Gap
Analysis
 Virginia Gap Analysis

The Virginia Gap Analysis Project
- Summary -

The Virginia Gap Analysis Project is a cooperative effort funded primarily by the National Biological Service and the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries to develop a statewide digital habitat map based on Landsat Thematic Mapper satellite imagery and other ancillary data sources. This map will be used to develop and further refine species distribution maps that can be combined to produce faunal richness maps by taxonomic group, ecological niche, or a variety of other factors. The faunal richness maps will be compared to a digital map of public lands that are managed to maintain biodiversity to determine the degree to which the public lands network includes the fauna of the state. Areas or species groups that are not sufficiently represented in the public lands network are termed "Gaps" in the protection network. The maps produced by the Virginia Gap Analysis Project will be verified in a variety of ways including field observation, use of existing covertype maps from cooperators, and airborne videography.

The Virginia Gap Analysis Project is assisting the Virginia Department ofGame and Inland Fisheries in thedevelopment and implementation of an outreach program called WildlifeMapping. This program is designed to get school children and adults in the system of making observations and reporting them to DGIF and the Gap Project.

Products from the Virginia Gap Analysis Project will include:
  1. A statewide digital habitat map for Virginia.
  2. An atlas of predicted species distribution maps for vertebrates and selected invertebrates that occur in Virginia.
  3. A digital map of public land boundaries in Virginia.
  4. A digital map of predicted species richness by a variety of taxonomic, ecological niche, or legal classification parameters.

Additional products include the recent Master's of Science theses of:

Important Links!

For more information about the Virginia Gap Analysis Project, please contact:

Jeff Waldon, Project Leader
Fish and Wildlife Information Exchange
Dept. of Fisheries and Wildlife Sciences
Virginia Tech
1900 Kraft Drive, Suite 250
Blacksburg, VA 24061
fwiexchg@vt.edu
(540) 231-7348 voice,
(540) 231-7019 fax