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The Integrated Wildlife Habitat Ranking System 2008

The Integrated Wildlife Habitat Ranking System (IWHRS) is a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) assessment tool that ranks the Florida landscape based upon the habitat needs of wildlife as a way to identify ecologically significant lands in the state, and to assess the potential impacts of land development projects. The IWHRS incorporates a wide variety of land cover and wildlife species data and presents it in an easy to understand classification schema.

The IWHRS is provided as part of the FWC’s continuing technical assistance to various local, regional, state, and federal agencies, and entities interested in wildlife needs and conservation in order to: (1) determine ways to avoid or minimize project impacts by evaluating alternative placements, alignments, and transportation corridors during early planning stages, (2) assess direct, secondary, and cumulative impacts to habitat and wildlife resources, and (3) identify appropriate parcels for public land acquisition for wetland and upland habitat mitigation purposes.

The IWHRS was originally developed in 2001 and underwent a major revision in 2007 using updated datasets. In 2008 changes were made to five of the data layers (Listed Species Locations, Species Richness, Managed Lands, Distance to Managed Lands, and Florida Forever Board of Trustees/Save our Rivers Lands) using data not available in 2007, and the Landscape Diversity layer was replaced with a much improved Spatial Heterogeneity layer.

Download the IWHRS 2008 Report in PDF format (~1.3MB). This file is a detailed report of the data and methodologies used to create the IWHRS 2008 including a discussion of the results.

Download the IWHRS 2008 final calculation (~30.3MB)

Download the various components of the IWHRS 2008 final calculation raster dataset. The IWHRS 2008 final calculation raster dataset is the result of a calculation of 10 data layers that represent important ecological aspects for wildlife in Florida. The 10 data layers used in the calculation of the IWHRS 2008 are:

Spacial Heterogeneity raster dataset (~7.2MB)

Roadless habitat patch size raster dataset (~12.6MB)

Strategic Habitat Conservations Areas raster dataset (~8.6MB)

Listed species locations raster dataset (~30.1MB)

Species richness raster dataset (~40.6MB)

Florida Natural Areas Inventory Habitat Conservation Priorities raster dataset (~9.4MB)

Managed lands raster dataset (~2.9MB)

Distance to ‘Managed Lands’ raster dataset (~5.1MB)

Landscape connectivity raster dataset (~3MB)

‘Florida Forever’ Board of Trustees / Save Our Rivers Lands raster dataset (~2.5MB)

For comments or questions, please contact Mark.Endries@MyFWC.com or call (850) 488-0588.