Field data for the Vegetation Mapping Inventory Project of Ninety Six National Historic Site

This reference is an assemblage of field data collected as part the baseline vegetation inventory for the park unit. Typical files here are vegetation plot data, accuracy assessment data, field photos, PDF showing locations of vegetation plots and accuracy assessment data, and other data for this type. Ecologists from NatureServe established ten permanently marked one-hectare circular plots within the park in a grid system and another five circular plots in unique ecological areas that were not covered by the initial grid-based plot layout. The permanently marked plots are available to be used by researchers on studies ranging from bird point counts to individual plant monitoring. Ecologists collected data on all unique vegetation communities within the park and identified seven natural and eleven human-modified or successional vegetation associations (unique ecological assemblages of plants) within the park boundary. Two ecological communities that either exist or may have existed prior to the establishment of the park within the park boundary may warrant special attention due to their relatively high global rank/rarity. The Floodplain Canebrake is a Coastal Plain and Piedmont community that is extremely rare due to suppression of fire and grazing and changes in land use within the range of cane. The Southern Piedmont Oak Bottomland Forest is an uncommon mature wetland forest that is well developed in the floodplain areas within the park boundary.