Part 3—Examine Maps and Present your Findings

Step 1 –
Access Maps and Locate the Wetland Sites

Using the Ramsar Sites Information Services, you will locate the wetland sites that you identified and analyzed in Parts 1 and 2.

  1. Go to Ramsar Sites Information Service.
  2. From the main menu, choose GIS & Maps > WebGIS or click the link for WebGIS.
    3. RamsarGISMain


  3. In the drop-down menu for Region, select Ramsar region 1 - Africa; in the drop-down menu for Country, select Mauritania. A new window showing the wetlands for your selections will display in an online Geographical Information System (GIS). The wetland sites will be marked with a yellow dot on the map.
    4. RamsarGISSelectAfrica

  4. Select Parq National du Banq d'Arguin by clicking on the yellow dot.
    5. RamsarGISSelectsite


  5. The map will redraw zoomed in to your selected site, in this example, the Parc National du Banc d'Arguin, in the country of Mauritania.
    6. RamsarGISSiteZoomed


  6. Along the top of the window, you'll see menus and buttons for Navigation and Tools. Click the zoom in tool (the magnifying glass with a plus sign) then drag a box over the region that includes the yellow dot. This will give you a zoomed-in view of the wetland site.
    7. Similarly, you can use the magnifying glass tool with a minus sign to zoom out to see part or all of the continent of Africa, keeping in mind where Mauritania is.
  7. Use the GIS Layers and Tools to examine the features in the region surrounding the site. You can click the Help button (the question mark icon) to show information on how to use the tools and capabilities of the Map Viewer, or you can simply experiment with the GIS tools to see how they affect the map.

    You can also access more information on the site by choosing Extra options: > Ramsar Information for this site to the right of the map. The following links will display.
    8. RamsarGISWebMapperInfo


  8. Repeat steps 1 - 7 above for your second site, Lac Tchad, in Niger.

Step 2 –
Present your Findings

Learn more about the wetland sites you chose by entering the site name or the name of a nearby city as a search term in an Internet search engine such as Google. View the information to try and determine what, if any, current news exists for the sites on topics such as drought conditions, flora and fauna disease, insect infestations, pollution, etc.

With a partner or in a small group, choose the one wetland site that you would most like your environmental club to help protect. Use the information comparing the two sites, the report on their characteristics plus information from the Web Mapper and other sources to compile a brief presentation that could persuade people to support the preservation of that particular wetland area.