Area inside of a polygon

[JoshuaStiller]

Hello.  I am new to GIS, and could use some advice. 

I have a polygon layer with 5km^2 breeding bird blocks.  I'm trying to find the area of different landcover types inside each block.  I have lumped the NLCD data into 4 separate raster files (1 for wetlands, ag land, urban/residential, and open water).  I can easily convert the breeding bird vector file into a raster if that makes it easier.  I'm just lost on how to get the area of these 4 landcover types in each block! 

Any suggestions? Thanks!

[NiklasNorrthon]

Store your vector data in a file geodatabase, and there will be a field in the attribute table for the shape area, which is automagically calculated for you.

To get that value in a script you need a cursor object. Search for that in the desktop help for sample code.

[ChrisSnyder]

If you go the all raster route, the Spatial Analyst Combine tool is what you will need (it's the raster equivalent of a vector "intersect" operation).