FLORIDA GEOGRAPHIC DATA LIBRARY DOCUMENTATION

TITLE: SAND SKINK AND BLUE-TAILED (BLUETAIL) MOLE SKINK CONSULTATION AREA

Geodataset Name:       CA_SKINK_JUL11
Geodataset Type:       SHAPEFILE
Geodataset Feature:    Polygon
Feature Count:         2
GENERAL DESCRIPTION:
The skink consultation area is a boundary line developed by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to be used as a guideline for Endangered Species Act consultation to direct section 7 and section 10 applicants to geographic locations where impacts to sand and blue-tailed mole skinks are most likely to occur, based upon suitable soils at appropriate elevations in the counties of occurrence of the species in central Florida.
DATA SOURCE(S):                    U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
SCALE OF ORIGINAL SOURCE MAPS:     Varies
GEODATASET EXTENT:                 State of Florida
PUBLICATION DATE: Unpublished Material TIME PERIOD OF CONTENT: 20111001 DOWNLOAD LINK: http://www.fgdl.org/metadataexplorer/explorer.jsp

FEATURE ATTRIBUTE TABLES:

Datafile Name: CA_SKINK_JUL11.DBF
ITEM NAME WIDTH TYPE
OBJECTID
4 OID
Shape
4 Geometry
OFFICE
25 String
CON_ADD
50 String
CON_CITY
25 String
CON_ZIP
10 String
CON_PHONE
12 String
ACRES
8 Double
DESCRIPT
50 String
FGDLAQDATE
36 Date
AUTOID
4 Integer
SHAPE.AREA
0 Double
SHAPE.LEN
0 Double

FEATURE ATTRIBUTE TABLES CODES AND VALUES:

Item
Item Description
OBJECTID Internal feature number.

Shape Feature geometry.

OFFICE Florida ecological services office responsible for consultation area.

CON_ADD Office contact address.

CON_CITY Office contact city.

CON_ZIP Office contact zip.

CON_PHONE Office contact phone.

ACRES Area of polygon in acres.

DESCRIPT GeoPlan Calculated Field "Skink Consultation Area"

FGDLAQDATE Date GeoPlan acquired data.

AUTOID Unique ID added by GeoPlan

SHAPE.AREA Area in meters

SHAPE.LEN Perimeter in meters

ACRES is the only attribute field.
USER NOTES:
This data is provided 'as is'. GeoPlan relied on the integrity
of the original data layer's topology
The attributes created by ArcInfo had no defined value within this shapefile 
and were deleted.  XTools pro 7.1 was used to create and update the attribute 
"ACRES".
GeoPlan relied on the integrity of the attribute information within
the original data.
Endangered Species Act consultation may be needed outside of the 
consultation area boundary if suitable soils for skinks are present at 
elevations at or above 82 feet above mean sea level or if either of 
these listed skinks or their sign are detected.

Geographic Information System (GIS) data for the consultation area 
boundary for sand and blue-tailed mole skinks.  The current consultation 
area map was developed to replace the 2003 consultation area map 
with an objectively-derived, revised version using the same biological 
information and data upon which the revised skink survey protocol is 
based.  The consultation area boundary also needed to be understandable 
for ease of use (i.e., follow county lines or existing landscape features 
where possible).

Horizontal accuracy is within the national map accuracy standards for 
1:24,000 GIS data.


None

The Florida Geographic Data Library is a collection of Geospatial Data
compiled by the University of Florida GeoPlan Center with support from
the Florida Department of Transportation. GIS data available in FGDL is
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with the data source to see if more recent versions of the data exist.

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or representations as to the truth, accuracy or completeness of the data
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A note about data scale: 

Scale is an important factor in data usage.  Certain scale datasets
are not suitable for some project, analysis, or modeling purposes.
Please be sure you are using the best available data. 

1:24000 scale datasets are recommended for projects that are at the
county level.
1:24000 data should NOT be used for high accuracy base mapping such
as property parcel boundaries.
1:100000 scale datasets are recommended for projects that are at the
multi-county or regional level.
1:125000 scale datasets are recommended for projects that are at the
regional or state level or larger.

Vector datasets with no defined scale or accuracy should be
considered suspect. Make sure you are familiar with your data
before using it for projects or analysis. Every effort has been
made to supply the user with data documentation. For additional
information, see the References section and the Data Source Contact
section of this documentation. For more information regarding
scale and accuracy, see our webpage at:
http://geoplan.ufl.edu/education.html

REFERENCES:
Ecological services office areas of responsibility:
http://www.fws.gov/northflorida/documents/USFWS_FL_ES_Office_Service_Areas.pdf

South Florida ESO:
http://www.fws.gov/verobeach/

North Florida ESO:
http://www.fws.gov/northflorida/

Panama City ESO:
http://www.fws.gov/PanamaCity/

DATA LINEAGE SUMMARY:
The skink consultation boundary was developed using counties where 
skinks occur (Putnam, Marion, Lake, Orange, Osceola, Highlands, Polk), 
elevation above sea level, and soils (Apopka, Arredondo, Archbold, Astatula, 
Candler, Daytona, Duette, Florahome, Gainesville, Hague, Kendrick, Lake, 
Millhopper, Orsino, Paola, Pomello, Satellite, St. Lucie, Tavares, Zuber).  
The layer of suitable skink soils (derived from "soils-sfwmd" layer) at elevations 
at or above 82 feet was merged with the published Lake Wales Ridge (LWR) 
boundary layer (Weekley et al. 2008).
Process Date: 
Sand and blue-tailed mole skink occurrence data were checked to make sure all points fell within these bounds. Process Date:
Outlier skink soils were removed from this layer (individual polygons or groups of polygons that were >2 km from other skink soils). These totaled 136 polygons. Process Date:
The Bombing Range Ridge was also removed because surveys have never documented skinks on this ridge. Process Date:
The revised baseline boundary for the skink consultation area was then developed using Hawth's Tools. Specifically, the input layer (skink soils at appropriate elevation merged with the LWR boundary) was converted to points. A fixed kernel analysis (bivariate normal, 100m grid) was used to create a raster distribution layer of the input point layer, and then a 'percent volume contour' boundary (parameter - 100%) was derived from the raster layer. The fixed kernel analysis generated a line around 1) all suitable soils at appropriate elevation, and 2) the LWR boundary, to create a line that included 100% of the data (minus the outliers). Process Date:
Where the baseline boundary crossed over into counties where skinks have never been documented, those counties were removed from the baseline boundary. This resulted in most of the western edge of the baseline boundary being along the county line. Process Date:
Because much of the eastern baseline boundary line was not located along county lines or physical features on the landscape that could be used to easily discern whether a particular site was "in" or "out" of the consultation area, this line was moved out to a road, county line, or lake. To do this, FDOT's "major_roads" layer was used if primary roads were relatively close to the baseline boundary. If few primary roads were close to the baseline boundary, the "detailed_roads" layer for the county of interest was added and the line was drawn to the nearest road in this layer (within reason- there were cases where it made more sense to follow a straight road rather than having the line curve excessively along secondary roads if the straight road was still very close to the baseline boundary). Note: There were a few locations where the baseline boundary was drawn slightly inside of the fixed kernel line but only if the road was very close to the fixed kernel line. Otherwise, the baseline boundary is just outside of the fixed kernel boundary. A few portions of the baseline boundary were drawn to the edges of lakes rather than to roads or county lines. The "south_florida-major_hydrology" layer was used for lake boundaries where they occurred close to the baseline boundary from Highlands County north through Orange County. Because this hydrology layer did not include lakes in North Florida, the "fl_lakes_ares_fdep" layer was used for the lake in Putnam County that was near enough to the baseline boundary to be taken out of the consultation area. Process Date:
GeoPlan received this dataset from the United States Fish and Wildlife Service via email on September 7, 2012. The data downloaded was in shapefile format and was in the following projection: Albers HPGN. - Added DESCRIPT field - Added FGDLAQDATE - Added ACRES - Added fields OFFICE, CON_ADD, CON_CITY, CON_ZIP, CON_PHONE - Deleted Area and Perimeter Ecological services office associated with consultation area was derived using info provided at: http://www.fws.gov/northflorida/documents/USFWS_FL_ES_Office_Service_Areas.pdf Consultation area polygon was cut using the construct features command in ArcMap to represent which ecological services office serves that particular area. Features were then dissolved on the field office. Layer was renamed ca_skink from skinks-consultation_area Process Date: 20120919
MAP PROJECTION PARAMETERS:

Projection                          ALBERS
Datum                               HPGN
Units                               METERS
Spheroid                            GRS1980
1st Standard Parallel               24  0  0.000
2nd Standard Parallel               31 30  0.000
Central Meridian                   -84 00  0.000
Latitude of Projection's Origin     24  0  0.000
False Easting (meters)              400000.00000
False Northing (meters)             0.00000

DATA SOURCE CONTACT (S):

Name:
Abbr. Name:
Address:


Phone:

Web site:
E-mail:
Contact Person:
         Phone:
        E-mail:
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
USFWS
South Florida Ecological Services Office, 1339 20th Street
Vero Beach, Florida
32960
772-562-3909

http://www.fws.gov/verobeach/ Marilyn_Knight@fws.gov Marilyn Knight

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Name:                   FLORIDA GEOGRAPHIC DATA LIBRARY
Abbr. Name:             FGDL
Address:                Florida Geographic Data Library
                        431 Architecture Building
                        PO Box 115706
                        Gainesville, FL  32611-5706
Web site:               http://www.fgdl.org

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