Field data for the Vegetation Mapping Inventory Project of Scotts Bluff National Monument

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. The sample area consisted of nearly the entire Monument with only a few sites (cliff faces and river sandbars) being inaccessible to sampling. Polygons were selected for sampling based on: 1) environmental factors (primarily aspect and slope, with soil type used for some vegetation types), 2) geographic location within the Monument (widely dispersed polygons of a given type were preferred), 3) representativeness (polygons were selected to capture the representative variability of each of the vegetation types), and 4) accessibility (in some cases certain polygons were difficult to access). The size of sample plots also varied with vegetation type. For woodland communities, 15 x 25 m plots were used to sample the canopy and sub-canopy strata, and 10 x 10 m plots were used to sample the shrub and herbaceous strata. An exception was made for the Juniperus scopulorum / Oryzopsis micrantha Woodland, where restricted stand size required using 10 x 10 m plots to sample all strata. For shrub communities, 10 x 10 m plots were used to sample both the shrub and herbaceous strata. Plot size for the large majority of the herbaceous communities was 10 x 10 m. An exception was made for the seepage community, where the restricted geographic coverage of the community mandated 5 x 5 m and 3 x 3 m plots (these were the largest plots that would fit comfortably within the stands). In sparsely vegetated communities, 10 x 10 m. plots were used to sample all strata for the majority of community types. In the rock outcrop community however, both 10 x 10 m and 5 x 5 m plots were used.