Georeferencing Methods

1) Read Guidelines: Point-radius method Point radius method for georeferencing locality descriptions and calculating associated uncertainty. John Wieczorek, Quinghua Guo, and Robert Hijmans

2) Review Checklist: Choose North/South American region or country of expertise

3)Download localities off of the Gazetteer- Search for localities by entering country or state name in the “Higher Geography” field

Click on “View” the localities

Download the localities into text file

Click on “Download”

Tab-delimited text file of PNG localities

4) Import tab-delimited text file of localities into Access or Excel format (Access file template can be found on Georeferencing Steps Website)

5) Post your claim to the listserv- Include region/country name and number of localities downloaded

6) Georeference the localities - first obtain maps and check georeferencing resources.

Use paper maps, e.g. 1:24,000 Quad Map of California

Or view maps electronically with GIS software e.g. ArcView

Use on-line gazetteers to locate named places:

Electronic maps can be obtained from many sources:

MapTech Terraine Navigator - Use this for US localities, $99 a state

Determine extent of named place while georeferencing:

Determine error using error calculator:

Example of city with offsets, extents and errors

Read through descriptions of all fields in Access database on the Georeferencing steps page:

Fill in these fields in Access database, even if did not georeference: Note: Please be explicit when providing a NoGeorefBecause reason. State the exact source of uncertainty, ambiguity or inconsistency in the locality description. ND 26 Jun, 2003.

List of some possible reasons why no georeferencing:

7) After finishing, ftp all files to: galaxy.cs.berkeley.edu and me with the file name & its contents (region, # of localities)

Automated Georeferencing: Biogeomancer For HerpNET best application is for US localities Can make extents available (for US, by Jan) Eventually would include maximum error automatically Could provide input/output in format friendly to HerpNET’s database fields Would still have to be verified by georeferencers at each institution

BioGeoMancer is found at

News from NSF Standard supplemental funds not available REU (Research Experience for Undergraduates) Collaborative REU Site grant Need to have association with a university Have to provide a research experience, possibly workshops, ArcView training or museum studies Each institution would write a budget justification and description, submitting them separately with KU as lead institution KU will supply major text for grant and link them Due 15 Sep 2004, write for 3 years