An Approach to Quantifying Desired Forest Conditions at Valley Forge National Historical Park
Largay E and Sneddon LA. 2007. An Approach to Quantifying Desired Forest Conditions at Valley Forge National Historical Park. Natural Resource Technical Report: Northeast Region. NPS/NER/NRTR—2007/082. Northeast Region, National Park Service. Philadelphia, PA
This report identifies an approach to quantifying desired conditions for two existing forest communities at Valley Forge National Historical Park (NHP); a Dry Oak Forest community and a Successional Tuliptree Forest community. The framework of the National Vegetation Classification System (NVCS) was used to write the descriptions for the desired conditions and compare target communities to globally described associations. We identified the desired condition of the Dry Oak Forest as a forest of essentially similar composition but with greater ecological integrity. The Successional Tuliptree Forest is itself an undesirable type, because as such, it has no known natural or historical analog. We propose that the desired condition of the Successional Tuliptree Forest is the conversion of this type to a native Mesophytic forest type with high ecological integrity. Historical records, witness tree data, and ecological studies from the Valley Forge area from the 1680–1800 time period were researched to determine the composition and structure of historical forests, particularly those that occurred on the landscape prior to and during the Revolutionary War encampment at Valley Forge from 1777–1778. We identified existing old growth examples of the Dry Oak Forest and the Mesophytic forest types as reference sites. Using a wide variety of historical data and present-day reference sites, we developed detailed descriptions of the target condition of both forest types.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Largay, Ery; Sneddon, Lesley
- Date of Issue
- 2007-03
- Publisher
- Northeast Region, National Park Service
- Units
- MIDN , VAFO
- Keywords
- Dry Oak Forest, Successional Tuliptree Forest, Vegetation Classification, Vegetation Inventory