Vegetation classification guidelines: National Park Service Vegetation Inventory, version 2.0

Lea, Chris

The objectives of the National Park Service (NPS) Vegetation Inventory are to classify vegetation as ecological community types in each of more than 250 NPS Inventory and Monitoring park units (“parks”) in the United States outside of Alaska and to map vegetation to that classification scheme developed for the unit. This guidance is a revision and update of the 1994 guidance on vegetation classification within the NPS Vegetation Inventory (The Nature Conservancy and Environmental Systems Research Institute 1994) and supersedes the 1994 version.This guidance should be read and referred to by all NPS staff and cooperators who apply vegetation classification within NPS Vegetation Inventory projects or who oversee such projects. In addition, this guidance may prove useful for other individuals or organizations who may need to apply the science of vegetation classification to resource inventory, mapping, and/or management activities. It is directed at professional vegetation ecologists and assumes that the reader has a basic understanding of vegetation ecology, including vegetation classification, and is more for developers of, rather than users of, vegetation classification products.Chapter 1 provides the context of vegetation classification, both within the NPS and in the agency’s role in development of national standards for vegetation classification. It describes important changes in approach from that of the 1994 version, and outlines requirements for projects funded by the NPS Vegetation Inventory.Chapter 2 provides information for “best practices” approaches to vegetation classification that NPS has found to provide useful to site-based resource inventory and management. It reviews and briefly describes common vegetation classification methods, but is not a treatise on them. A number of manuals and papers on classification methods are referenced.Chapter 3 describes how vegetation classes derived from the methods described in Chapter 2 may be applied to map classes, especially for common problems in achieving a 1:1 relationship between the two.Chapter 4 describes reporting requirements for vegetation classification products developed by the NPS Vegetation Inventory.Chapter 5 describes considerations and methods for developing diagnostic field keys to vegetation classes. While not part of a vegetation classification per se, field keys are important tools in successfully applying a vegetation classification scheme that has been derived from field-observed data to vegetation mapping, including the assessment of a vegetation map.Appendix A describes the history of the National Vegetation Classification Standard (NVCS) and its prescribed taxonomic content, the United States National Vegetation Classification (USNVC) and the relationship of the NPS Vegetation Inventory to them.Appendix B is a glossary of vegetation classification terms.Appendix C and Appendix D provide examples of vegetation descriptions and diagnostic field keys, respectively.

Vegetation classification guidelines: National Park Service Vegetation Inventory, version 2.0

Series