The goal for lab 4 was to enhance our geoprocessing tool set in ArcMap for bear habitat management in the study area of Marquette County, Michigan. We have been asked by the DNR department of Michigan to come up with a map that would be able to portray different scenarios that the DNR have asked for. For example, they want to know how many bears live in the county, what are their locations (x,y, coordinates), if the bears are in DNR management land, how far from streams were they located, along with much more information that will allow the DNR of Michigan to conduct their study and determine the best ways to manage the bear population and habitat.
      When making this map I used various different data tools to help get the information the DNR asked for the map. A few of those tools were spatial joins, buffers, multiple ring buffers, and export. Without knowing how to use these tools and what they do, it would have been impossible and taken forever to make a simple map that the DNR had asked for. I used a spatial join multiple times for this map, a spatial join joins attributes from one feature to another based on the spatial relationship. One example of a spatial join for this map is: I joined bear locations and land cover with a spatial join allowing me to determine the best areas in the county for bear cover. I also used the tool buffer, which would allow me to show the area of my liking around a point, line, or polygon. I was asked to show 500 meters around all the streams to determine if a stream played a role in the habitat for bears. Without these tools making this map would have been very hard to complete to the liking of the DNR.
      With my map I am confident that the DNR would be able to make good decisions in determining how to control and take care of the bear population along with the bear habitat in Marquette County. On my map I put all the bear locations that are symbolized by a yellow triangle. I put all the types of habitat that covers the entire county, and by using a spatial join I am also able to show suitable bear habitat throughout the county on my map. You can also see streams and DNR management lands in the county, however the DNR lands had to be 5 kilometers from urban and built up lands. Another big factor for this type of map is that it is more of a wide map then a height map, so I had to change the layout view to 11x17 allowing for better viewing of the map by the DNR.

Sources: all of the data were downloaded from the Michigan Center for Geographic Information
      Landcover: www.mcgi.state.mi.us/mgdl/nlcd/metadata/nlcdshp.html
      DNR units: www.dnr.state.mi.us/spatialdatalibrary/metadata/wildlife_mgmt_units.html
      Streams: www.mcgi.state.mi.us/mgdl/framework/metadata/Marquette.html