January 29, 2026

In the Nation’s Biodiversity Hot Spot, a Geographic Approach Ignites Conservation Action

By Sunny Fleming

Soft focus of ivory billed woodpecker sitting on wood trunk in green forest of Costa Rica in dayligh

Does the Lord God Bird still hold court in the forests of Alabama? Doubtful, but not impossible. The last confirmed sighting of the bird, formally known as the ivory-billed woodpecker, was decades ago.

Of the over 140 experts consulted on Alabama’s new State Wildlife Action Plan (SWAP), one believes the Lord God Bird still reigns. Rather than labeling the bird “extirpated” (nonexistent) in the state, the expert believes this woodpecker species should receive Priority 1 status, the Alabama SWAP’s highest conservation category.

The Lord God Bird is just one of around two thousand species the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources needs to consider as part of its SWAP. This time, the department has simplified the process by using geographic information system (GIS) technology to gather input, map species locations, and talk about the results.

Assessing Biodiversity in Alabama

Alabama hosts a special combination of habitats because it sits at the crossroads of major biogeographic regions. The Appalachian Mountains sweep down from the Northeast with cool, moist forests that are home to amphibians. The Gulf Coastal Plain spreads across the state’s southern half with warm wetlands and longleaf pine savannas. The Tennessee River Valley cuts through the north, and the Mobile-Tensaw River Delta is the second largest in the continental US.

This makes Alabama one of the most biodiverse states east of the Mississippi, and fourth in the country overall. Over 6,300 species live in Alabama, with the country’s most diverse collection of freshwater fish (340 species), mussels, crayfish, snails, and turtles.

Alabama's GIS-powered survey replaced three-day expert meetings with a streamlined six-week data collection process. The tool combines interactive maps with crowd-sourced input, letting experts visualize species locations and reach consensus more efficiently.
Despite comprising just 1.6 percent of the Lower 48 states' land area, Alabama hosts 60 percent of the nation's mussel species and 43 percent of aquatic snails. This outsized biodiversity—especially in freshwater species—makes data-driven conservation planning essential.
Alabama's diverse habitats—from Appalachian forests to Gulf wetlands—support over 6,300 species. GIS technology now helps conservation teams map and protect this biodiversity hot spot, making data-driven decisions about which species need priority support.
Each species in Alabama's SWAP gets its own data page with range maps, conservation status, and expert input. The Trispot Darter—once thought extirpated but rediscovered in 2008—shows how location data helps experts make informed decisions about conservation priorities.

Getting a read on the health of each species across these distinctive ecosystems is no easy task.

In 2015, the last time Alabama compiled a SWAP, the state assembled eight “taxa” teams—mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish, crayfish, mussels, and snails—each comprised of 15–20 experts in these fields. The teams met for three days, discussing and reaching consensus on species threats and necessary conservation actions.

To solicit further information, the agency sent spreadsheets to other experts. The data had to be cleaned up, collated, and considered alongside the teams’ recommendations. The number of species reviewed jumped from 1,200 in 2015 to 2,100 in 2025, with experts ranking each one for its conservation priority. From there, officials would compile the SWAP report.

In addition to the status of protected species, the report included information on the geographic distribution of species, the threats they face, and suggested conservation plans. The process was time-consuming, a marathon of classification that inevitably threatened to go into overtime.

“It’s one thing to go through the mammal species in three days—we only have about 70—but it’s another thing to go through 400 birds,” said Ashley Peters, a GIS specialist with the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources’ State Lands Division.

The gopher tortoise—a keystone species whose burrows shelter the eastern indigo snake—remains a priority for conservation. Interactive range maps like this one help experts identify where habitat corridors could connect fragmented populations across southern Alabama.
The eastern indigo snake depends on gopher tortoise burrows for survival. After decades of absence, reintroduction efforts released 78 snakes starting in 2008. Maps tracking their range help conservation teams identify where protecting one keystone species benefits another.
Two separate black bear populations occupy different regions of Alabama—the nominate subspecies in the northeast and the Florida subspecies in the south. The gap between them reveals where habitat restoration could reconnect populations and address genetic isolation concerns.
Kemp's ridley sea turtles—the world's most endangered sea turtle—nest primarily in Mexico but forage in Alabama's coastal waters. Mapping their narrow range along the Gulf Coast helps conservation teams track where turtle excluder devices on shrimp trawlers are most critical.
American oystercatchers nest only in coastal Mobile County, making their entire Alabama population vulnerable. The map's narrow yellow line along the Gulf shows how limited habitat makes protecting beach access and reducing human disturbance critical.

A New Geographic Approach

Beginning in 2023, the department began a radical overhaul of how species information would be gathered for the 2025 SWAP, to improve the process and accuracy of the data. Peters worked closely with Katie Lawson, a GIS expert and professor in Auburn University’s Department of Crop, Soil, and Environmental Sciences.

The tool they developed uses a GIS web app builder to combine expert input and make it specific to a location prior to the ranking process. A drop-down menu within each taxa section lists all the species under review within that group.

When an animal is selected from the menu, the site provides an interactive map showing where that animal has been and where it is now. It also offers an ArcGIS Survey123 GIS-powered survey form, prompting respondents to note whether they believe the animal deserves protected status. If the answer is yes, respondents answer additional questions.

“At a quick glance, the experts could see when a species was last in an area,” Peters said. “If the map was mostly yellow, then we had a lot of recent observations. If it was more red, then we had older observations. And so they could talk about whether these were accurate.”

Collected data is displayed on a dashboard. With charts and graphs, the dashboard serves as a way to crowdsource expert opinions regarding each species. Data was collected over a six-week period, then the taxa groups met for one day to discuss the results and make SWAP recommendations.

Experts start by examining species range maps. Yellow areas show where the Escambia map turtle currently lives, while red highlights regions where biologists need updated occurrence data. Just 16 confirmed sightings helped define this rare turtle's habitat.
Each species page reveals conservation trajectories. The turtle's status improved from Priority 3 in 2005 to Priority 2 in 2015—a sign that protection efforts are working, though the species still needs focused conservation attention.
The dashboard lets experts toggle between all reptile species to compare patterns. Yellow dots mark recent sightings, while red shows older observations. This Copperhead distribution, with hundreds of points, contrasts sharply with rarer species.
After reviewing ranges and data, experts recommend specific conservation strategies—from habitat restoration to education programs. This crowdsourced approach replaces marathon three-day meetings with focused one-day consensus sessions.

Efficiency improvements are obvious—three days of fraught discussions reduced to a one-day meeting to discuss collected data. Just as important, the process facilitates a holistic approach to prioritization.

The completed SWAP contains additional maps of the entire state. These maps answer such questions as how to connect conservation areas via habitat corridors.

A species’ conservation status has funding implications. “The funding source for species of greatest conservation need is the federal State Wildlife Grant Program,” Lawson said. “That means that the ranking directly influences which species can receive financial support for conservation projects.”

The Longleaf Pine Ecosystem

GIS maps and analysis also make it easier to understand the health of Alabama’s ecosystems. The state has one of the largest concentrations of longleaf pine land in the US. Over the last century, much of the nation’s longleaf pine lands, one of the most species-rich ecosystems outside of the tropics, have disappeared.

Among its major threats is the prevalence of fire suppression on developed land. Periodic fires are an important way the ecosystem recharges itself.

A controlled community burn in a longleaf pine forest.

The SWAP analysis revealed some signs of improvement in that ecosystem. The pinewoods litter snake, for example, no longer needs extra conservation protection.

The eastern indigo snake is a keystone species, meaning it has an importance to the ecosystem’s health disproportionate to its abundance. It relies on burrows dug by the gopher tortoise, itself a keystone species. Both species are still designated as needing priority conservation efforts.

Data like this, visualized on GIS dashboards and maps, helps the state plan conservation efforts by revealing ways to expand the ecosystem. Habitat corridors, for example, can unite disconnected parts of the ecosystem. But building those corridors requires coordination with private landowners. The maps help determine where potential corridor lands are located and how they might be enlisted for ecosystem protection.

A Fair SWAP

One important improvement of the new GIS-based process over the previous method is the way it facilitates better communication and consensus.

As expected, the Lord God Bird, whose presence in Alabama is disputed among bird experts, required some discussion. “In the bird room, we had one person who feels like it’s still here, and he didn’t want to give up on it,” Peters said.

The dashboard made it clear to the holdout that his opinion was an outlier.

“The room talked about it, and he wanted to give it Priority 1 status, but he finally said, ‘I know I’m the odd man out,’ so we decided to call it extirpated,” Peters said.

“That’s one of the biggest impacts the dashboard has,” Lawson added. “For a lot of those species where people disagreed, a pie chart displayed how many experts were recommending various priority levels.”

The data democratizes the process, while ensuring that nobody dominates the conversation.

“If four people recommend P1 and two people recommend P2, everybody’s voice was in that pie chart, regardless of whether they were reluctant to speak up,” Lawson said. “Because there are some shyer people, who have profound knowledge of these species, but are maybe more likely to go with the opinions of others.”

Beyond streamlining the ranking process, Alabama’s GIS-based approach addresses a persistent challenge in conservation planning. SWAPs are typically contained on PDF documents. The static medium limits the underlying data that various partners—land trusts, nonprofits, and executive branch implementation agencies—need to inform conservation projects.

Alabama’s online platform ensures that maps, data, and conservation priorities are accessible and updateable. A conservation partner can view exactly where a species has been documented, note current threats, and make informed decisions regarding where to focus restoration work or pursue land acquisition.

Learn more about how conservation professionals apply GIS to protect biodiversity.

The late E.O. Wilson, whose groundbreaking ideas about interconnected systems and synthetic thinking were decades ahead of their time, continues to inspire how we understand complex networks and ecological relationships.

Preserving E.O. Wilson’s Legacy

Alabama’s Mobile-Tensaw Delta begins where the Alabama River meets the Tombigbee River. It stretches south for 45 miles, flowing into Mobile Bay near the city of Mobile.

In between those two points lies the second-most biodiverse delta in the nation, and one of the most ecologically diverse regions in the world. The famous naturalist E.O. Wilson, who grew up in Mobile, called Mobile-Tensaw “America’s Amazon.”

It was the delta that spurred Wilson’s love of the natural world. As early as age 12, he was exploring the area. (Carefully, no doubt, for he surely knew it was the nation’s largest breeding grounds for black bears.) Throughout his life, he would describe the delta as one of the world’s most special places.

Four years after Wilson’s death, the E.O. Wilson Foundation is paying tribute to the delta he loved. The organization recently announced the formation of the Mobile-Tensaw Land Between the Rivers Preserve.

In partnership with The Nature Conservancy, the foundation acquired eight thousand acres of private land in the delta, shielding the area from planned industrial development. The preserve will help protect more than 700 land and aquatic animal species. The protected area is home to more than 500 plant species and one of Alabama’s last patches of unprotected bottomland forests, a critical habitat for migratory birds.

The region also has important cultural significance. The land between the rivers was once home to the Naniaba tribe and served as a buffer zone between the Choctaw and Creek confederacies.

The preserve is part of the larger Half-Earth Project. The effort grew out of Wilson’s belief that the way to preserve biodiversity was to devote half of the planet to human-free zones. Half-Earth uses GIS as a key wayto explain and share its efforts through interactive maps (including one of the new preserve) and ArcGIS StoryMaps stories.

The Nature Conservancy initially used GIS to guide site selection for the preserve. Maps were layered with information like digital elevation models and data from remote sensing.

The Nature Conservancy hopes the preserve will eventually become part of the National Wildlife Refuge System, giving it further protection. The organization also plans to preserve more of the delta, connecting it with protected lands that stretch from the Gulf Coastal Plain to the Appalachian Mountains.

E.O. Wilson would expect nothing less.

Sunny Fleming

Sunny Fleming is Esri’s industry lead for the domains of environment, conservation, and natural resources. Throughout her career, she has applied GIS concepts and technology to environmental policy, conservation, and natural resources, from monitoring species in the field to helping state parks manage assets and assess their economic impacts. She continues to pursue her passion for the environment by helping industry leaders streamline and improve their work with GIS technology, whether in the field or in the office, and whether setting policy or managing wildlife and resources.