The Oklahoma Natural Heritage Inventory (ONHI) provides information about Oklahoma's biodiversity to all interested parties. To this end, ONHI maintains several databases pertaining to the biota and ecological communities within the state and associated geographical areas. These databases offer different degrees of accessibility and functionally. Oklahoma Biodiversity Information System (OBIS) is publicly accessible. However, due to the sensitive nature of some of the data, precise locational and attribute information is withheld from the publicly accessible sites. Individuals may nonetheless request information from any of the database we maintain by using our online request form or by contacting our data manager directly.
Due to the sensitive nature of some of these data, ONHI typically only provides information to the section level (1 mi2) or coarser. This information is usually provided in tabular format, though other data options are available (e.g. Esri shapefile format, see below). You may use our online information request form or contact our database manager directly to request site specific information. For any provided site, we will search the general area (typically a 5 mile radius, though taxa and habitat specific requirements are taken into account) for occurrence information on federal or state regulatory species. ONHI can also do taxa specific searches. For instance, if you require information on a specific regulatory species, ONHI can provide this. Once a search is complete, ONHI will provide a small report on our findings. Please provide an email address to which we can send the report.
We generally do not provide spatially-explicit data (e.g. GIS datasets) for regulatory species. Nonetheless, if your project requires such data, ONHI may be able to provide data under our data agreement. However, this will be decided on a case-by-case basis. Additionally, ONHI partners with NatureServe providing data for the Multi-Jurisdictional Dataset (MJD). Certain data requests, especially those covering large geographic areas (e.g. multiple states), as best handled by NatureServe.
ONHI also maintains and/or contributes to additional datasets, such as the Protected Areas Database of the United States, Oklahoma Ecological Systems Mapping, and the Game Types of Oklahoma. For more information on these datasets, please contact our data manager.
Requests are sent to Kristin Comolli, ONHI Data Analyst. Please allow 7 to 10 business days for a reply. If you do not hear back after 10 days, please contact Kristin (kcomolli@ou.edu) to report a problem.
