Describes the types of rocks found throughout the state by age and explains how to interpret the accompanying cross section.

Dane County's abundant surface water resources are monitored and assessed primarily by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (WDNR). Major streams and lakes are classified into categories based on the aquatic organisms present. These classifications provide an indication of water quality and fishery conditions.

Agricultural and urban land uses contribute to nutrient rich runoff reaching surface waters. Impervious surfaces and removal of wetlands also increases the flow of stormwater to local waterways. Explore issues facing our surface water and see maps of degraded water resources.

Effective water quality planning depends on long-term assessment and monitoring. The Capital Area Regional Planning Commission uses long-term datasets to evaluate regional trends.

Learn about practices meant to protect the region's streams, shorelands, and lakes.

Dane County
Land and Water Resources Viewer: An interactive county map showing watershed boundaries, thermally sensitive areas, cold water communities and more.

This Data set and graphs show the Deer harvest each year (1960-present) in Wisconsin for both the state and for each county.

Geoscience data from the Wisconsin Geological Survey
This interactive map shows locations of site data for our collections of geophysical logs and Quaternary core.

Geophysical, Quaternary Core, and Rock Core Data is available from across Wisconsin.

The Invasive Plants Association of Wisconsin (IPAW) is a nonprofit membership-based organization whose mission is to promote better stewardship of the natural resources of Wisconsin by advancing the understanding of invasive plants, preventing their introduction, and encouraging the control of their spread.

IPAW defines an invasive plant as one that invades native plant communities and impacts those native communities by displacing or replacing native vegetation.

Both a weed and an invasive plant are plants out of place, but an invasive plant encroaches into forests, roadsides, and prairies where it is unchecked by the devotions of an obsessive backyard gardener. The ramifications of invasive plants are so much more ominous than that of weeds because they can and do destroy the natural diversity of native vegetation.

Ironically, many invasive plants get their foothold through well-meaning gardeners who introduce the species as a lovely accent to their patch of paradise. However, many of these plants come from foreign lands and do not have the natural controls that a native plant has. Soon the nonnative plant takes over – first the garden and then, by propagating via the wind, through deep-set runners and by the cooperation of willing birds carrying the seeds, more distant places.

There are many plants that are invasive in Wisconsin. To ease you into an awareness of invasive plants without overwhelming you, IPAW has developed this list of Wisconsin’s Worst foreign invaders.

This arc GIS application interactive layer shows the stages of glacial ice locations across Wisconsin from 32,000 to 11,000 years before present. Shows subsequent impacts of glacial activity to form moraines, eskers, kames, and other glacial features including glacial melting to form glacial lakes and features across Wisconsin.

The PFAS Interactive Data Viewer is a mapping tool that incorporates datasets from several DNR programs to show locations throughout Wisconsin that have been impacted by PFAS.

Information included in the PFAS Interactive Data Viewer include locations with known PFAS contamination and whether clean up has been completed; results from testing municipal drinking water for PFAS; locations with PFAS-related fish and game consumption advisories; and waterbodies throughout Wisconsin sampled for PFAS during targeted or routine monitoring.

These data may not reflect current PFAS levels at specific locations.

This map shows 15 general soil regions of Wisconsin. On the landscape, many of these regions appear distinctly different from each other because differences in land form and use are often related to the characteristics of the soils. Map is available from ~ University of Wisconsin-Extension, GNHC, and Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey. F.w. Madison, Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey H.F. Gundlach, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Soil Conservation Service. 1993.

The Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey (WGNHS) has been serving Wisconsin for over 125 years. Part of the Division of Extension at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, WGNHS provides objective scientific information about the geology, mineral resources, and water resources of Wisconsin. We conduct research, map Wisconsin’s geology, and share information through our publications and outreach.

WGNHS has been producing geologic maps, scientific reports, and more for over 125 years. Our publications catalog offers thousands of maps, reports, datasets, and other publications—all of which are available to view and download for free.

The Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey (WGNHS) was created by the Wisconsin Legislature in 1897. It is the descendant of earlier state surveys in Wisconsin, which date back to 1854.

WGNHS, part of the Division of Extension at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, is an interdisciplinary organization that conducts natural resources surveys and research to produce information used for decision-making, problem-solving, planning, management, development, and education. Survey is defined to include resource inventory as well as basic and applied research and analysis. WGNHS has no specific regulatory or enforcement responsibilities.

Mission of WGNHS:
Understanding the earth • Charting its history • Sustaining its resources
The Survey conducts earth-science surveys, field studies, and research.

We provide objective scientific information about the geology, water resources, and mineral resources of Wisconsin.

We collect, interpret, disseminate, and archive natural resource information.

We communicate the results of our activities through publications, technical talks, our website, social media, and responses to inquiries from the public.

These activities support informed decision making by government, industry, business, and individual residents of Wisconsin.

The National Water Information System (NWIS) Mapper provides access to over 1.5 million sites contained in the USGS National Water Information System (NWIS), including sites where current and historical surface-water, groundwater, springs, and atmospheric data has been collected. Users can search by site type, data type, site number, or place.

This is the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources GIS Open Data Portal. It is a free resource for locating, viewing, and downloading data developed and/or maintained by the Wisconsin DNR.

This site also has categories of: Water, Fish and Wildlife, Managed Lands, Cimate, Parks and Recreation, Forestry, Transportation, Indexess and PLSS, Boundaries and Land Cover and Vegetation.

The site also has Applications that include: PFAS in Wisconsin Data Viewer, Western Coulee and Ridges Regional Master Plan, North Central Forest Regional Master Plan, Wildfires Dashboard App, Report Invasive Species, CWD reporting, etc

The Badger State is home to a wide variety of rocks and minerals, some of which you may find familiar and others you may not recognize. In this interactive guide, the Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey takes you on a journey through the state, exploring our most important rocks and minerals.

This is a publicly accessible website that contains wonderful, Wisconsin based data. Maybe the writing from another Wisconsin HS science teacher provides some ideas for how these data could be used.

The Surface Water Data Viewer is a mapping tool for the State of Wisconsin. It provides interactive web mapping tools for a variety of datasets, including chemistry, physical, and biological data. The data managed in layers that can be turned on and off as needed. The Homepage of the Surface Water Data Viewer (SWDV) has many commonly used features labeled. Descriptions of the features are as follows:

Toolbars: There are a variety of toolbars with different themes to help complete tasks using the SWDV. The toolbars can be used to display the layers available to the map, add or remove shapes, text, or measurement features, identify points, print maps, and more!

Search Bar: Using the search bar, you can search monitoring stations by number, locations by keyword, and waterbodies by WBIC. Be careful when using the search bar, partial matches do not always appear in the results.

Navigation Pane: The navigation pane is where results will appear from searches, where you are able to select layers for the map, and features for printing. You will be able to refine the data that is shown here, if desired. You can hide the navigation pane by clicking the left-facing arrow at the top.

Coordinates and Coordinate System: The coordinates will display for any point moused-over on the map. Click the black triangle to select your preferred method for displaying lat/long (DD, DMS, DDM, Mercator). The right-most option in this pane allows you to manually manage thescale of the map. Click on the scale tool, and selected the desired scale at which you wish to view the map. Select Go to implement changes.

Scale Bar: The scale bar shows the current extent of the map.

Whole State View: This view describes what is being shown on the main map relative to the entire state. A blue rectangle will cover the region of the state being shown on the map. You can also navigate the map by moving the blue square around the state-view map. If you print a map, this whole state view will print in the corner as a reference. You can minimize this view by clicking the corner-facing arrow in the top left edge of the box.

Show/Hide Toolbar: Use this button to hide the toolbar for a larger view of the map. If you have hidden the toolbar, you can also use this button to show it again.

Wisconsin's Tornadoes for the current and a link to find historical tornadoes from past years (shown on map with details of each tornado). From National Weather Service.

The Water Condition Viewer (WCV) is an interactive mapping tool that focuses on water condition, monitoring, assessment and management data. Data includes Clean Water Act, Monitoring Projects, Healthy Watersheds Assessments, Targeted Watershed Assessments, Wastewater Evaluation, Watershed Planning, County Land and Water Plans, Nine Key Element Plans and more. All datasets from specialized themes are available from this main, general set of layers.

This map viewer was created for use by the general public to view water quantity data collected by Wisconsin DNR (WDNR), the US Geological Survey (UGSG) and the Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey (WGNHS).

This viewer also provides a means for the public to view pending high capacity well applications and recently approved wells. As required by Wisconsin law, these locations are generalized to display at the public land survey section level. Therefore, any well or surface water intake is symbolized by the section in which is located. Clicking identify on sections may return multiple records, one for each data point. This viewer contains a number of layer groups:

Well Applications and Approvals – This layer displays the locations of pending and approved high capacity well applications. It includes:
High capacity wells that have been applied for by the owner but have not yet been approved by the Department
High capacity wells approved in the last 30 days
High capacity wells approved by WDNR but that have not yet been constructed

High Capacity Withdrawal Locations – This layer show the location of high capacity wells constructed and available for use as well as currently registered high capacity surface water withdrawals. It includes:

Existing high capacity wells
Existing surface water withdrawals

USGS Water Quantity Monitoring – This layer shows the locations of groundwater level monitoring points, streamflow gages, and lake level gages monitored and recorded by USGS. It includes currently active monitoring locations as well as historical monitoring locations. Symbol sizes are scaled according to the number of measurements taken at each location.

WDNR Water Quantity Monitoring Groundwater Protection Features – This layer shows the locations of streamflow and lake level measurements maintained by WDNR. It includes a variety of measurement types taken by WDNR staff, partner organizations, county staff and volunteers.

WGNHS Spring Monitoring – This layer shows the location of springs surveyed by WGNHS staff between 2015 and 2017. Note that spring flow varies seasonally and annually. In addition, many spring locations are located on private land and not accessible by the public without landowner permission.

Groundwater Protection Features – This layer displays the locations of groundwater protection features as defined by Wisconsin Rule NR820. It includes trout streams, outstanding and exceptional water resources, and springs with a flow rate surveyed by WGNHS of 1 cubic foot per second (CFS) or greater. Note that all 1 CFS may not have been surveyed.

Guidance for how to use WDNR Geocortex viewers can be found here. For more information, please contact the water use section at 608-266-2299 or at DNRWATERUSEREGISTRATION@wisconsin.gov

This is a map showing the location and severity of each of the Earthquakes which have occurred in Wisconsin in recorded history. This site is also where one can find recent or historic earthquakes, lists, information on selected significant earthquakes, earthquake resources by state, or find webservices.