Northeast Temperate Network Rare Plant Monitoring

Northeast Temperate Network

Supporting documents and datasets associated with implementation of the Northeast Temperate Network's Rare Plant Monitoring Protocol. The overall goal is to monitor status and trends in the structure, function and condition of NETN forested ecosystems in order to inform management decisions affecting those systems. The plot based approach collects a variety of landscape structure, stand structure, tree, understory, and soil metrics. First year of data collection was 2005. The Appalachian National Scenic Trail (APPA) is a treasured national icon. This extended footway traverses the Appalachian uplands of the eastern United States for more than 2100 miles from Georgia to Maine, providing a unique and rich opportunity for outdoor enjoyment and appreciation of natural and cultural resources. It is managed cooperatively by the National Park Service (NPS) Appalachian Trail Park Office (ATPO), the Appalachian Trail Conservancy (ATC, a private, non-profit organization), more than 30 local trail clubs, the US Forest Service (USFS), and the 14 states through which the Trail passes. These groups are committed to conserve unimpaired the natural and cultural resources of the Appalachian Trail and its surroundings, as directed by the National Park Service Organic Act and the National Trails System Act. Rare species are an important Trail resource. In 2004, the NPS Inventory & Monitoring Network convened a meeting of APPA resource managers and monitoring staff to prioritize “Vital Signs” for resource monitoring. Vital Signs are defined as “a subset of physical, chemical, and biological elements and processes of park ecosystems that are selected to represent the overall health or condition of park resources, known or hypothesized effects of stressors, or elements that have important human values.” The convened group selected Priority Rare, Threatened or Endangered (RTE) Species as a “Category 2” Vital Sign, to be monitored after higher priority “Category 1” Vital Sign monitoring (Shriver et al., 2005). The importance of rare species to the Trail had previously been recognized. Starting in 1989, surveys were undertaken in cooperation with state Natural Heritage offices to inventory RTE species within the Trail corridor. Between 1989 and 2001, APPA Natural Heritage inventories were conducted in each of the 14 Trail states. These inventories varied slightly among states as a result of working with different state Natural Heritage offices. Rare vascular plants and rare or exemplary natural communities were inventoried in all states, rare vertebrates in some, and rare non-vascular plants and invertebrates were inventoried in just a few states. These inventories documented more than 1,700 occurrences of RTE species as well as rare or exemplary vegetation communities in more than 500 Natural Heritage Sites within the Trail corridor (Appendix B). Of these, about 300 occurrences are globally rare species (ranked G1, G2 or G3), and several federally endangered or threatened species have been documented along the Trail. Most of the rare species occurrences are plants. While rare plants are found in every Trail state, notable hotspots or clusters of rare species occur in the Presidential Range of the White Mountains of NH, the Mt. Rogers-Whitetop area of southwest VA, and the Roan Mountain area along the border of NC and TN.

Northeast Temperate Network Rare Plant Monitoring

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