Relationships between National Wetlands Inventory maps and hydrophytic vegetation in Florida

Abstract

This paper reports a preliminary investigation about National Wetlands Inventory (NWI) maps to see how they might be used in conjunction with other sources of information to provide offsite wetlands regulatory delineation. A geographic information system was used to overlay and compare NWI maps with ground-based tree species composition data from the US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Forest Inventory and Analysis program (FIA). Ninety plots located in the Apalachicola National Forest in northern Florida were used. The NWI mapped 42 of the 90 plots as wetlands. FIA data was used to calculate Prevalence Index (PI) scores. Twenty-four additional plots had PI < 3.0 and thus had hydrophytic vegetation. These plots may also have been wetlands by the Cowardin definition. The hypothesis that wetland identification did not differ between natural-origin versus planted forests was evaluated. NWI classified 61% of natural stands with PI <3.0 as wetlands, whereas 38% of planted stands with PI < 3.0 were mapped as wetlands. There were statistically significant differences (P < 0.05) in the relationships between hydrophytic vegetation and wetland status for plantations and natural-origin stands. FIA data was used to compare the actual frequency of species found in wetlands with the frequency ranges assigned for the NWI Regional Indicators. The observed frequency of occurrence in NWI-mapped wetlands agreed with the Regional Indicator frequency range for 6 of the 18 species. Most species not in agreement were reasonably close to their assigned frequency range, but some differed substantially. While this was a pilot-scale study, we believe that this technique can ultimately yield valuable new information on the tree characteristics of NWI wetlands, especially at larger spatial scales, such as states or regions.