Data Model for Botanical Gardens and Zoological Parks

A team of GIS managers at North American botanical gardens and zoos has joined together to design, build, and test a GIS data model for mapping the facilities and plant collections maintained at these much loved living museums across the country. Called the "Alliance for Public Gardens GIS," this new group is open to the staff of any garden, zoo, or campus that uses its landscape for teaching or research.

The federal granting agency, the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), is providing seed money for this national collaborative effort to build a Landscape Management GIS. Team leaders and partners include the UC Davis Arboretum, the Institute for GIScience at San Francisco State University, the Biodiversity Informatics Center at the UC Berkeley Museum of Vertebrate Zoology (MVZ), the San Diego Zoological Society, the San Francisco Zoo, the Missouri Botanical Garden, and the Chicago Botanical Garden.

The Botanical Gardens and Zoological Parks Data Model is currently under construction, and we anticipate a late June 2008 release date at the Annual Conference of the American Public Gardens Association (APGA) in Pasadena, CA.

For more information on the Alliance for Public Gardens GIS or the Botanical Gardens and Zoological Parks Data Model, please contact Brian Morgan, the GIS Manager at the UC Davis Arboretum, at bjmorgan@ucdavis.edu for more information.

Downloads – Intro Documents

These documents are a good starting point to learn about applications of GIS in botanical gardens and zoos, as well as best practices for this discipline.

• Creating Your GIS, Part I presentation from APGA GIS Symposium [PDF-13.2 MB] (submitted 12/04/2007)
• APGA GIS Symposium Keynote presentation, Part 1 of 2 [PDF-12.6 MB] (submitted 12/04/2007)
• APGA GIS Symposium Keynote presentation, Part 2 of 2 [PDF-20.1 MB] (submitted 12/04/2007)

Downloads – Working Documents and Design Templates

If you are interested in seeing work-in-progress for the Landscape Management data model, the following files illustrate some of the work that has been prepared and presented by the group.

• Designing a New Standard for Plant Collection Mapping Poster [PDF-14.9 MB] (submitted 12/04/2007)
• Planning GIS for Landscape Management: Key Issue Summary [PDF-20.8 KB] (submitted 12/17/2007)
• Technology Seminar Information Product Description Summary [PDF-41.2 KB] (submitted 12/17/2007)

User Community

If you would like to connect with other staff at zoos, botanical gardens, or college and university campuses that are interested in GIS, or are currently using GIS to manage their facilities and/or collections, please join the publicgardensgis@ucdavis.edu e-mail list (listserve) by sending an e-mail request to Mary Burke, the Director of Planning and Collections at the UC Davis Arboretum, at mtburkeATucdavisDOTedu.