The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) is the principal Federal agency that provides information to the public on the extent and status of the Nation's wetlands. The National Wetlands Inventory has extensive mapping expertise and knowledge involving wetland identification and classification, image interpretation, and digital data capabilities. Reflecting this expertise, the NWI is regularly asked to provide resource mapping guidance, and with increasing frequency, is requested to map riparian areas of the western United States.The goal of the National Wetlands Inventory is to provide the citizens of the United States and its Trust Territories with current geospatially referenced information on the status, extent, characteristics and functions of wetland, riparian, deepwater and related aquatic habitats in priority areas to promote the understanding and conservation of these resources.With growing interest in riparian habitats in the western U.S., the Service undertook early riparian mapping projects for several agencies in Arizona in the early 1990s. Additional projects were conducted for the National Park Service in Nevada, and the Bureau of Land Management in Wyoming. Each project included a variety of definitions, classifications, and mapping conventions. The Service was regularly asked to map riparian areas in the western United States, but lacked a standard definition and conventions to guide the mapping.In 1997, the National Wetlands Inventory made a commitment to assemble a committee of habitat and cartographic specialists to develop the Service’s riparian definition and mapping conventions. In 2000, western Service Regions began implementation of the system.Though riparian digital map data can stand alone, it is recommended that this data be used in conjunction with the associated Cowardin wetlands data. This will provide a “complete picture” of the ecological systems that have been mapped.Since riparian data collection is a product of more recent times, a large percentage of the data is available digitally, though some of the early riparian mapping efforts are still hardcopy-only.For more information visit: http://www.fws.gov/wetlands/Other/index.htmlData viewable on the Wetlands Mapper: http://www.fws.gov/wetlands/Data/Mapper.htmlData available as a REST service at:http://107.20.228.18/ArcGIS/rest/services/Riparian/MapServerData available as a KML at: http://www.fws.gov/wetlands/Data/Google-Earth.htmlData available as a WMS at: http://www.fws.gov/wetlands/Data/Web-Map-Services.html