Vegetation mapping at Moores Creek National Battlefield

McManamay, Rachel; Curtis, Anthony; Byrne, Michael

The Southeast Coast Network (SECN) worked with the support of the National Park Service (NPS) Vegetation Inventory Program (VIP) to describe and map vegetation at Moores Creek National Battlefield (MOCR). This mapping effort was accomplished through collaboration with the Southeast regional office of NatureServe (Raleigh/Durham, NC). The mapping area is 70 hectares (173 ac), encompassing the entire boundary of MOCR and an additional buffered area of adjacent private lands. NatureServe ecologists identified plant associations for MOCR and a remote sensing specialist from the SECN completed the vegetation mapping using 1:12,000-scale, color infrared aerial photography and digital orthophotography. NatureServe collected vegetation and environmental data from 12 vegetation classification plots, and the remote sensing specialist assessed 35 observation points. SECN network staff conducted an accuracy assessment (AA), which entailed sampling 54 additional points. Fieldwork and mapping were completed between 2005 and 2011. A total of 17 map classes were developed to map the vegetation and general land cover of MOCR and surroundings, including the following: 10 map classes representing natural/seminatural vegetation at the association level in the National Vegetation Classification System (NVCS), one map class representing cultural vegetation (e.g., developed) in the NVCS, and six map classes representing non-vegetated units (e.g., open water bodies, buildings, roads, etc.). Features were interpreted using 1:12,000 scale digital color-infrared aerial photography (flown 31 May 2009) through heads-up-digitizing in ArcGIS (Version 9.3, © 2008 Environmental Systems Research Institute, Redlands, California). Polygons were mapped to a 0.5-ha minimum mapping unit (MMU).

Vegetation mapping at Moores Creek National Battlefield

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