Restorable Wetlands Inventory

Minnesota's wetlands provide crucial habitat for waterfowl and other wildlife, assist in flood control, and help maintain water quality. However, the state has lost half the wetlands that existed before European settlement and these drained wetlands have not been mapped as part of the National Wetlands Inventory. This appropriation is enabling efforts by Ducks Unlimited to provide a complement to the National Wetlands Inventory by identifying and mapping drained wetlands that have the potential to be restored to provide their various benefits once again. This data will be used to prioritize wetland restoration in the Red River Valley and the Prairie-Hardwood region of South-Central Minnesota. Mapping is taking place in 170 townships in Clay, Mahnomen, McLeod, Meeker, Nicollet, Norman, Renville, Sibley, Wilkin, and Wright counties.

Overall Project Outcome and Results
The Restorable Wetlands Inventory (RWI) is a complement to the National Wetlands Inventory (NWI) completed in late-1980s by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. An administrative decision was made developing the original NWI not to map wetland basins in Minnesota identified as completely drained. The number and acreage of completely drained wetlands that were not mapped by the NWI process is significant. In Pope County alone, 25,000 acres of completely drained wetland acres were missed in the NWI mapping process - nearly 19% of the total wetland resources in that county. The RWI project identifies and digitizes the completely-drained depressional wetlands that were not mapped by the NWI process. Restorable wetlands mapping is based upon protocols established for NWI allowing seamless integration of the two datasets.

The 2009 Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund appropriation provided the last project funding needed to complete, remaining RWI mapping for the glaciated, tallgrass prairie region of Minnesota - an additional 6,120 square miles. The mapping occurred in approximately 178 townships in Clay, Mahnomen, McLeod, Meeker, Nicollet, Norman, Renville, Sibley, Wilkin, and Wright Counties.

In the Red River Valley Complex, over 132,000 individual restorable wetland basins were identified and mapped. In the Prairie-Hardwood Complex, almost 131,000 individual restorable wetland basins were identified and mapped.

As in previous phase of the mapping project, partners included the LCCMR, Ducks Unlimited, Inc., and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The photo-interpretation and digitization work was contracted to the GIS Lab at South Dakota State University.

The attached "Restorable Wetlands Inventory: Final Status Map" displays the counties and townships that were completed under the M.L. 2008, M.L. 2009, and prior appropriations.

Data will be distributed on the web via the Minnesota GIS Data Deli (http://deli.dnr.state.mn.us) and the Ducks Unlimited, Inc. (http://www.ducks.org) websites.