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Natural Heritage Information by Town

The Natural Heritage & Endangered Species Program has many resources available to help municipalities, land trusts, watershed associations, and others with biodiversity protection at the local level.

Rare Species Occurrences by Town - Natural Heritage maintains a list of all MESA-listed species observed and documented in each town. These lists are regularly updated. Also see the complete MESA list with links to many interesting species fact sheets.
Number of Certified Vernal Pools by Town - This page provides a tally of the number of vernal pools that have been certified in each town. Natural Heritage "certifies" the occurrence of vernal pools based on documentation of the pool's use by one or more groups of species that rely on vernal pools. See our Vernal Pool section for more information about vernal pool certification.
Priority Habitat and Estimated Habitat Maps - Large-sized regulatory maps for use with the Massachusetts Endangered Species Act (MESA) and the Wetlands Protection Act can be viewed by contacting your town or city's conservation commission or planning board. See our Regulatory Review section for many other ways you can view Priority Habitat and Estimated Habitat in your area.
NHESP GIS datalayers - Natural Heritage has created several GIS datalayers that will be of interest to those protecting biodiversity at the local level. These include sites that have been identified as Potential Vernal Pools and sites with Natural Communities of conservation interest.