Species records can be searched for by specific location. There are various ways to do this on the NBN Atlas.
Searching pre-defined areas
To select an area from an existing list, click Locations from the NBN Atlas homepage and select Explore by pre-defined area (1).
Select a region from the list. The regions fall into six different categories: Local Authorities GB, Counties Northern Ireland, Local Environmental Centre boundaries, Watsonian Vice Counties, Vice Counties Ireland and National Parks (2).
Selecting an area from the drop-down lists will cause it to be highlighted in grey on the map (3). Click Zoom to region to focus on the selected area (4). Click on the highlighted region.
Records for every species are automatically displayed (5) and are detailed on the left (6). From here, you can view and download the records for your area too (7). Use the drop-down boxes to select a species. Now, only records for that species will be displayed on the map.
You can use the time controls above the map to display how species have been recorded over time. Click the play button and the records will be displayed by decade, in sequence (8).
Use the Map Opacity Controls and tick boxes to select which records are displayed and alter their appearance (9).
Searching by location
Click Locations from the NBN Atlas home page (see 1, above). Select Explore by address, postcode or location.
On this map, records are displayed within the radius of the specified point (10). Yellow points are those with few records, whilst red ones have more (11).
To display records around an address or location, enter it in the search bar (12). You can click and drag the red pin to change the location on the map.
To change the size of the search radius, select 0.1, 0.5, 1, 2, 5 or 10 from the dropdown list (13). The species with records in that search area are listed on the left, next to the number of records for that species (14).
Select a species or species group to display only those records. When you select a species, options will appear below its name for viewing the species’ information profile or a list of all the displayed records.
Searching by polygon
Click Locations from the NBN Atlas home page (see 1, above). Select Search by polygon. You will be presented with the spatial search map. Use the drawing tools on the left of the map to draw an area in which to search for records (15). Once you have drawn an area, a dialogue box will tell you the number of species and the total number of records represented in that area.
You will be given the option to search for records in the area or remove the area (16). If you select to search for records in the area, you will be directed to the map component of the occurrence records page. Here you can alter the appearance of the map or records, see View species information on a map for further more information.
All species records for the area will be displayed, to view a list of all records, click the Records tab (18). The list of records can be filtered if necessary using the filters tool on the left (19).