Bird community monitoring for Mesa Verde National Park: 2015 summary report
Holmes JA and Johnson MJ. 2016. Bird community monitoring for Mesa Verde National Park: 2015 summary report. Natural Resource Data Series. NPS/SCPN/NRDS—2016/1065. National Park Service. Fort Collins, Colorado
The National Park Service (NPS) Inventory and Monitoring Program was designed to determine the currentstatus and monitor long-term trends in the condition of park natural resources, providing park managers with astrong scientific foundation for making decisions and working with other agencies and the public for the protectionof park ecosystems. The Southern Colorado Plateau Network (SCPN) of the NPS has identified birdcommunities as a vital sign for network parks (Thomas et al. 2006). The goal of bird community monitoring is toprovide status and trends data on bird communities in several predominant habitats where integrated upland orriparian vegetation monitoring is also occurring. For Mesa Verde National Park (MEVE), Southern Colorado Plateau Network (SCPN) and park staff selected theLoamy Mesa Top Pinyon-Juniper ecological site as an important ecosystem for vegetation and bird communitymonitoring. The Mesa Top Pinyon-Juniper woodland is a unique ecosystem containing old-growth pinyonjuniperwoodland. It faces several threats, including changing fire regimes, climate change, and the invasion ofnonnative species. In 2015, through a Colorado Plateau Cooperative Ecosystems Study Unit agreement with SCPN, we continuedmonitoring the upland bird community of the target pinyon-juniper habitat in MEVE, which had been initiatedin 2007, and continued in 2009 and 2012. In this report, we document monitoring activities in the 2015 field seasonand summarize the data that were collected.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Holmes, Jennifer; Johnson, Matthew
- Date of Issue
- 2016-11
- Publisher
- National Park Service
- Units
- MEVE , NRSS , SCPN
- Keywords
- bird communities, bird habitat data, mixed conifer, pinyon-juniper, variable circular plot counts
- Subjects
- Ecological Framework: Biological Integrity | Focal Species or Communities | Birds