Creating ~3' Contours in River Bottom Topos

[Dpierce72]

Caveat: I don't work for Caltopo and I'm in no way claiming to be an expert. This has worked for me, but I'm hopeful someone with even more expertise might chime in. I could not find anything on this specific topic via search.

Flat Terrain / River Bottoms

In some of the river bottoms I hunt, they can go 5-10 feet under water fairly quickly. I tried, forever, to work w/the Arkansas GIS department to build a topo map w/3' (or ~1 meter) contour intervals vs the standard 20' on a 7.5min topo.

Finally, I found DEM [Digital Elevation Model] shading on Caltopo (which I'd already used a good bit). By utilizing this function, I can essentially create my own elevation map on 1 meter (~3') intervals. The elevation changes are color coded. This is especially useful in knowing; do I need a boat, can I get through with knee boots, hip boots, chest waders, will this elevation support oak tree growth ...or more prone to support gum trees etc.

If you think this information could help you, below are the instructions to enable DEM shading in Caltopo and determine elevation changes of ~3' intervals.

Reminders:
The data in Caltopo is stored as integer meters, so the most detailed you can get is ~3' elevation changes and not all areas will have this level of accuracy ...and not all areas will have much change.

Instructions:

Go to Caltopo.com
Select Add New Layer
Select DEM Shading
Elevation
This will take some trial and error on your part, as no two properties are exactly the same elevation.

As a starting point, look to the upper right corner and you will see a Lat/Lon box that also has elevation. As you move your cursor on the map, the Lat/Lon changes, as well as the elevation.

Once you determine the area you need to measure, you will add that into the Elevation boxes and select a different color for each rang.

Example: Starting at 150 going to 165+
- 150-152 (Red)
- 153-155 (Orange)
- 156-158 (Yellow)
- 159-161 (Dark Blue)
- 162-164 (light blue)
- 165+ (Green)

You could use whatever colors you want, this is just for illustration.

Again, range will depend on your area, but where a normal 7.5 minute topo map would only reveal one line in this example, you will now have up to 6, assuming that elevation change is happening w/in the area of interest.

Hope this helps some folks. It sure does help me since my local GIS office won't...

[Trout]

This is awesome, thanks for sharing!

[justdirtyfun]

That sounds very helpful. Post of the week material.

[Buckshot20]

Nice. Ty

[jwilkstn]

Good stuff, thanks for putting this together

[Dpierce72]

You bet ...hoping it helps someone. I bounced around river bottoms for years unable to attain this level of detail from my state GIS department. Will be interested in hearing once some guys try it out in their local areas...

[UofLbowhunter]

Caveat: I don't work for Caltopo and I'm in no way claiming to be an expert. This has worked for me, but I'm hopeful someone with even more expertise might chime in. I could not find anything on this specific topic via search.

Flat Terrain / River Bottoms

In some of the river bottoms I hunt, they can go 5-10 feet under water fairly quickly. I tried, forever, to work w/the Arkansas GIS department to build a topo map w/3' (or ~1 meter) contour intervals vs the standard 20' on a 7.5min topo.

Finally, I found DEM [Digital Elevation Model] shading on Caltopo (which I'd already used a good bit). By utilizing this function, I can essentially create my own elevation map on 1 meter (~3') intervals. The elevation changes are color coded. This is especially useful in knowing; do I need a boat, can I get through with knee boots, hip boots, chest waders, will this elevation support oak tree growth ...or more prone to support gum trees etc.

If you think this information could help you, below are the instructions to enable DEM shading in Caltopo and determine elevation changes of ~3' intervals.

Reminders:
The data in Caltopo is stored as integer meters, so the most detailed you can get is ~3' elevation changes and not all areas will have this level of accuracy ...and not all areas will have much change.

Instructions:

Go to Caltopo.com
Select Add New Layer
Select DEM Shading
Elevation
This will take some trial and error on your part, as no two properties are exactly the same elevation.

As a starting point, look to the upper right corner and you will see a Lat/Lon box that also has elevation. As you move your cursor on the map, the Lat/Lon changes, as well as the elevation.

Once you determine the area you need to measure, you will add that into the Elevation boxes and select a different color for each rang.

Example: Starting at 150 going to 165+
- 150-152 (Red)
- 153-155 (Orange)
- 156-158 (Yellow)
- 159-161 (Dark Blue)
- 162-164 (light blue)
- 165+ (Green)

You could use whatever colors you want, this is just for illustration.

Again, range will depend on your area, but where a normal 7.5 minute topo map would only reveal one line in this example, you will now have up to 6, assuming that elevation change is happening w/in the area of interest.

Hope this helps some folks. It sure does help me since my local GIS office won't...

I have been doing this for a year or two now. It works good!
Like to add that using the inferred feature helps locate small humps and island that dont stick out in natural color in swamps too

[Dpierce72]

can you explain the inferred feature? Is it something you manually set? Would you mind providing directions to turn it enable it? I know it would help me and maybe others. At least by the term I don't think I'm familiar with it...

[DrHogFan]

Caveat: I don't work for Caltopo and I'm in no way claiming to be an expert. This has worked for me, but I'm hopeful someone with even more expertise might chime in. I could not find anything on this specific topic via search.

Flat Terrain / River Bottoms

In some of the river bottoms I hunt, they can go 5-10 feet under water fairly quickly. I tried, forever, to work w/the Arkansas GIS department to build a topo map w/3' (or ~1 meter) contour intervals vs the standard 20' on a 7.5min topo.

Finally, I found DEM [Digital Elevation Model] shading on Caltopo (which I'd already used a good bit). By utilizing this function, I can essentially create my own elevation map on 1 meter (~3') intervals. The elevation changes are color coded. This is especially useful in knowing; do I need a boat, can I get through with knee boots, hip boots, chest waders, will this elevation support oak tree growth ...or more prone to support gum trees etc.

If you think this information could help you, below are the instructions to enable DEM shading in Caltopo and determine elevation changes of ~3' intervals.

Reminders:
The data in Caltopo is stored as integer meters, so the most detailed you can get is ~3' elevation changes and not all areas will have this level of accuracy ...and not all areas will have much change.

Instructions:

Go to Caltopo.com
Select Add New Layer
Select DEM Shading
Elevation
This will take some trial and error on your part, as no two properties are exactly the same elevation.

As a starting point, look to the upper right corner and you will see a Lat/Lon box that also has elevation. As you move your cursor on the map, the Lat/Lon changes, as well as the elevation.

Once you determine the area you need to measure, you will add that into the Elevation boxes and select a different color for each rang.

Example: Starting at 150 going to 165+
- 150-152 (Red)
- 153-155 (Orange)
- 156-158 (Yellow)
- 159-161 (Dark Blue)
- 162-164 (light blue)
- 165+ (Green)

You could use whatever colors you want, this is just for illustration.

Again, range will depend on your area, but where a normal 7.5 minute topo map would only reveal one line in this example, you will now have up to 6, assuming that elevation change is happening w/in the area of interest.

Hope this helps some folks. It sure does help me since my local GIS office won't...

AWESOME! Thanks this will help me in these Arkansas bottoms as well. Bet we hunt some of the same territory too.

[Dpierce72]

Caveat: I don't work for Caltopo and I'm in no way claiming to be an expert. This has worked for me, but I'm hopeful someone with even more expertise might chime in. I could not find anything on this specific topic via search.

Flat Terrain / River Bottoms

In some of the river bottoms I hunt, they can go 5-10 feet under water fairly quickly. I tried, forever, to work w/the Arkansas GIS department to build a topo map w/3' (or ~1 meter) contour intervals vs the standard 20' on a 7.5min topo.

Finally, I found DEM [Digital Elevation Model] shading on Caltopo (which I'd already used a good bit). By utilizing this function, I can essentially create my own elevation map on 1 meter (~3') intervals. The elevation changes are color coded. This is especially useful in knowing; do I need a boat, can I get through with knee boots, hip boots, chest waders, will this elevation support oak tree growth ...or more prone to support gum trees etc.

If you think this information could help you, below are the instructions to enable DEM shading in Caltopo and determine elevation changes of ~3' intervals.

Reminders:
The data in Caltopo is stored as integer meters, so the most detailed you can get is ~3' elevation changes and not all areas will have this level of accuracy ...and not all areas will have much change.

Instructions:

Go to Caltopo.com
Select Add New Layer
Select DEM Shading
Elevation
This will take some trial and error on your part, as no two properties are exactly the same elevation.

As a starting point, look to the upper right corner and you will see a Lat/Lon box that also has elevation. As you move your cursor on the map, the Lat/Lon changes, as well as the elevation.

Once you determine the area you need to measure, you will add that into the Elevation boxes and select a different color for each rang.

Example: Starting at 150 going to 165+
- 150-152 (Red)
- 153-155 (Orange)
- 156-158 (Yellow)
- 159-161 (Dark Blue)
- 162-164 (light blue)
- 165+ (Green)

You could use whatever colors you want, this is just for illustration.

Again, range will depend on your area, but where a normal 7.5 minute topo map would only reveal one line in this example, you will now have up to 6, assuming that elevation change is happening w/in the area of interest.

Hope this helps some folks. It sure does help me since my local GIS office won't...

AWESOME! Thanks this will help me in these Arkansas bottoms as well. Bet we hunt some of the same territory too.

I bet you're right ...

[mihunter101]

can you explain the inferred feature? Is it something you manually set? Would you mind providing directions to turn it enable it? I know it would help me and maybe others. At least by the term I don't think I'm familiar with it...

I think he means infrared?

[Dpierce72]

That comment was posted by another, not in the original post. Hopefully they will weigh-in to answer your question.

[Bman409]

Wow. Thanks for sharing that

I started playing around with that DEM shading and I discovered you can do the same thing for slope that you can do for elevation

Instantly was able to use that to locate benches on hillsides!!

Thank you!!!!!!!

[xpauliber]

Awesome tip! I need to start using this mapping software more often. I used to use Terrain Navigator to upload all my GPS points, and make notes but they quit offering a downloadable version.

I would ultimately love to find a mapping software that could synch with my GPS and when I go out scouting, I turn the tracking feature on the GPS and then when I get home, the exact track I walked could be uploaded to the software.

Also, I remember seeing how you could somehow take pics with your phone and then if you have geolocating turned on in your phone, when you upload those pictures, they automatically go to the spot on the map where you took the pic.

I think that would be the ultimate scouting tool to be able to snap pics of rubs, scrapes, beds, food sources, stream crossings, kill trees, access points, etc. and have them all saved and marked on a map with GPS coordinates. I’m still trying to find if/what’s available out there that could accomplish that. I scout so much on so many different properties that it gets hard to keep track of.

[Trout]

Awesome tip! I need to start using this mapping software more often. I used to use Terrain Navigator to upload all my GPS points, and make notes but they quit offering a downloadable version.

I would ultimately love to find a mapping software that could synch with my GPS and when I go out scouting, I turn the tracking feature on the GPS and then when I get home, the exact track I walked could be uploaded to the software.

Also, I remember seeing how you could somehow take pics with your phone and then if you have geolocating turned on in your phone, when you upload those pictures, they automatically go to the spot on the map where you took the pic.

I think that would be the ultimate scouting tool to be able to snap pics of rubs, scrapes, beds, food sources, stream crossings, kill trees, access points, etc. and have them all saved and marked on a map with GPS coordinates. I’m still trying to find if/what’s available out there that could accomplish that. I scout so much on so many different properties that it gets hard to keep track of.

You can do this with onx. Only downside is the onx subscription fee, but I think it's totally worth it. The topo layer in onx isnt on the same level as caltopo so I'll export and open with on the computer. I also saw caltopo had an app now, not sure what its capable of yet.