Land Use / Land Cover Change

WARC first implemented geographic information systems (GIS) in 1980 to help monitor the nature and extent of wetland habitat changes. The center continues to use GIS, remote sensing, and other computer based technologies to address a wide range of natural resource related issues.

Researchers at WARC will use data and models to produce probabilistic maps of current and future wetland inundation, coastal wetland extent, and coastal and wetland trangression.

USGS researchers will will survey elevation and vegetation in wetlands and vegetated dunes on Horn, Petite Bois, and Ship Islands; Correct the best available lidar-based digital elevation model; estimate inundation for the Gulf Islands National Seashore under various water levels and relative sea-level rise scenarios; and quantify and predict potential marsh migration for the Gulf Islands National...

Eighteen USGS coastal scientists from all four coasts of the conterminous United States are working together to advance the understanding of climate change and sea-level rise impacts to coastal wetlands.

USGS scientists are using a spatially-explicit Bayesian network model to predict the difference between energetic value and energetic demand for stopover habitats for migrating landbirds.

USGS scientists will be analyzing weather surveillance radar observations of birds departing stopover habitats to measure responses to climate change.

The Mississippi barrier islands are dynamic coastal landforms that are the first line of defense between the Gulf and the Mississippi mainland coast. These islands are experiencing changes in structure (land area and habitat) and geomorphic processes (erosion and accretion) due to frequent intense storms, relative rise in sea level, and changes in sediment supply. A long-term monitoring and...

To assess use of dredge material areas, avian ecologists from USGS WARC are conducting bird surveys across the annual life cycle.

WARC will assess Cape Sable seaside sparrow population response and viability under different management and habitat change scenarios. The USGS EverSparrow model will be run on future scenarios, and differences in the predicted probability of presence and the efficacy of varying conservation strategies will be evaluated.

Mole skinks that occur on Florida’s islands rely on sand beaches, beach berms, and dunes, making them particularly vulnerable to sea level rise and storm surge. USGS researchers predicted the impacts of sea level rise and storm surge on habitat for the Florida Keys mole skink ( Plestiodon egregius egregius), the Cedar Key mole skink ( P. e. insularis), and the Egmont Key mole skink (known from a...

Researchers at WARC are determining if temporal mismatches between digital elevation models and land cover data can impact estimates of inundation of beach habitat for barrier islands and low-lying beaches off the Gulf Coast of Florida.

While islands are some of the most biodiverse places on earth, they are also among the most threatened. Researchers from WARC and Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission are assessing the vulnerability of Florida’s coastal islands to inundation from sea-level rise and estimating potential loss of the terrestrial biodiversity on Florida’s islands.