Official Site of The State of New Jersey
New Jersey’s State Wildlife Action Plan (SWAP) offers a strategic and cost-effective approach to conserve the state’s wildlife resources for the future. The Plan identifies priority actions that we, as a conservation community, can implement over the next five to ten years to address the myriad threats facing our wildlife populations and their habitats. Proactive management actions are intended to keep wildlife species from becoming threatened or endangered, or to aid in the recovery of those that are already listed.
Our current Plan was approved by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in July, 2018. Its development was led by the NJDEP Fish and Wildlife with input from more than 50 stakeholder organizations as well as the public. The Plan identifies species of greatest conservation need in New Jersey, including 107 focal species of the highest conservation priority, and provides a guide to actions that will preserve these species of greatest conservation need.
New Jersey’s Wildlife Action Plan can be viewed and downloaded here (pdf, 33.7mb).
The Conservation Focal Areas described in Chapter 2, Section III of the plan (pages 33-71) are available through the interactive CFA Explorer mapping application and for download at NJDEP Open Data.
What is a State Wildlife Action Plan?
State Wildlife Action Plans (SWAPs) are proactive plans created by virtually every U.S. state and territory to assess the health of each state’s wildlife and habitats, identify the problems they face, and outline the actions that are needed to conserve them over the long term. A SWAP is required by Congress in order for a state wildlife agency to continue receiving federal State Wildlife Grants.
What are State Wildlife Grants?
Essentially, State Wildlife Grants (SWG) fund state programs that serve as “preventive medicine” for at-risk species, in an effort to avoid federal Endangered Species Act listings. SWG-funded programs are based on the cooperation of partners from the public and private sectors through voluntary collaborative efforts. These efforts bring about mutually desirable, effective projects focused on fish and wildlife species as well as habitats of greatest conservation need. SWG funds must be matched with state or private money.
See NJDEP Fish and Wildlife’s State Wildlife Grant Reports.
NJ State Wildlife Action Plan Contents
Introduction and Chapters 1 – 5
- Cover, Acknowledgments, Executive Summary, and Table of Contents (pdf, 815kb)
- Roadmap and Guide to NJ SWAP (pdf, 189kb)
- Introduction and Overview (pdf, 195kb)
- Chapter 1 – New Jersey’s Most Vulnerable Wildlife (pdf, 559kb)
- Chapter 2 – Habitats of New Jersey (pdf, 1.21mb)
- Chapter 3 – Threats and Actions for Focal Wildlife and Habitats (pdf, 814kb)
- Chapter 4 – Monitoring (pdf, 349kb)
- Chapter 5 – State Wildlife Action Plan Revision Process (pdf, 110kb)
- Sources (pdf, 142kb)
Appendices A- N
- Appendix A – Criteria for Selection Species of Greatest Conservation Need (pdf, 238kb)
- Appendix B – New Jersey’s Species of Greatest Conservation Need and the Selection Criteria Each Fulfilled (pdf, 589kb)
- Appendix C – Species of Greatest Conservation Need, their Distribution within New Jersey, and Habitat Associations (pdf, 672kb)
- Appendix D – Profiles of the Focal Species of Greatest Conservation Need (pdf, 6.09mb)
- Appendix E – Delineating Conservation Focal Areas (pdf, 413kb)
- Appendix F – Habitat Crosswalk (pdf, 207kb)
- Appendix G – Conservation Focal Areas’ Habitat Types (pdf, 305kb)
- Appendix H – List of Threats and Action Drivers (pdf, 387kb)
- Appendix I – List of Conservation Actions (pdf, 591kb)
- Appendix J – Threats to and Conservation Actions for the Focal Species of Greatest Conservation Need (pdf, 10.9mb)
- Appendix K – Projects to Conserve New Jersey’s Wildlife Populations of Concern (pdf, 2.27mb)
- Appendix L – Action Development Workshops’ Invitees & Attendance (pdf, 40.9kb)
- Appendix M – USFWS TRACS Indicators to Measure Success of Conservation Actions (pdf, 721kb)
- Appendix N – Glossary (pdf, 155kb)
Attachments I – IV
- Attachment I – Northeast Lexicon Report (pdf, 1.29mb)
- Attachment II – Landscape Project Report, v 3.3 (pdf, 6.02mb)
- Attachment III – Climate Change Summary for the New Jersey Wildlife Action Plan (pdf, 371kb)
- Attachment IV – Guidelines for Integrating Plant Species of Conservation Concern into Wildlife Action Planning and Implementation (pdf, 8.19mb)
