Species Editor User Guide

The Basics  
Amend the existing distribution map by drawing inside the polygon to reduce the distribution area, or outside the polygon to expand the distribution area.
  
When you draw a line or point, a 'notes' box will appear in the left-hand column. This will give you the option to provide notes or comments about the line or point you just added. Users are encouraged to add notes. Where relevant, this information will be added to the outputs as they can be very helpful to other users.

​You can also view this video tutorial on how to use the species editor.
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Delete a line
  • Click the ‘Select’ tool
  • Draw a box around the point or line you want to delete
  • Click the ‘Delete’ tool

You don’t need to draw a box around the entire line. Selecting any part of the line will select the entire line.
 
Alternatively, you can delete the last line you drew by clicking the ‘undo’ tool or click the ‘delete’ button on the pop-up.
Cut a line into two or more lines
  • Click the cutting tool
  • Draw a line across where you want to cut your line
 
Useful for cutting and deleting a section of line and redrawing that section rather redrawing the entire line.
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Adjusting small sections
  • Select line
  • Hover your mouse over the line and click
  • Hover your mouse over the line until the hand icon appears and click again. Vertices (gray dots) and nodes (white dots) will appear
  • Drag the vertices until you achieve your desired shape
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Use for fine scale adjustments for small areas.
 
DO NOT zoom in or out while editing vertices, you will lose the edits on the section of line you are working on. 
Adjusting larger sections
  • Cut your line and delete the section you want to adjust
  • Click line until vertices and nodes appear (described above)
  • Drag the end vertex across the gap. Either leave a small gap between the ends or use snapping (described below)
  • Click the node in the middle (the white dot) and drag it to your desired position
  • Dragging the node will turn it into a vertex and create two new nodes
  • Continue moving and creating vertices and nodes until you achieve your desired shape
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Sometimes it might be easier to draw a new line between the gap rather than using the method described above.
 
DO NOT zoom in or out while editing vertices, you will lose the edits on the section of line you are working on. 
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Delete vertices
  • Right mouse click the vertex you want to delete.
  • Click the ‘Delete’ popup
Joining two lines (snapping)
  • Click one line until vertices and nodes appear (described above)
  • Drag the end vertex close to the end of the other line
  • Hold down your CNTL key
  • When the blue cross appears let you mouse button go, the line will ‘snap’ to the end
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You’ll probably need to zoom in close to the line you want to snap too.
 
Unfortunately, you can’t ‘snap’ lines while drawing lines.
 
Snapping is not critical. We can join the lines during post-processing. Just make sure you leave a small obvious gap between the end of the lines.
Other notes
You can’t pan across a map while drawing. Therefore, if the line you want to draw won’t fit on your screen, draw the line in smaller segments, and pan across as required. Leave a small obvious gap between the lines, or snap the ends of all of your smaller line segments once you’ve completed your line. DO NOT TRY TO JOIN LINES WITHOUT SNAPPING. It makes post-processing really difficult.