Field data for the Vegetation Mapping Inventory Project of Ocmulgee Mounds National Historical Park

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. Field work and ground truthing for Ocmulgee Mounds NHP took place in May and June 2014. Field visits were aimed at giving specific attention to representative habitats, rare and important communities, areas that had been managed, disturbed, or invaded, and plots previously surveyed by NatureServe to collect data on canopy species composition, diagnostic species for the National Vegetation Classification System, and terrain, similar to NatureServe’s “Quick Plot” surveys. Field crews carried paper field maps with the UTM grid coordinates, elevations, roads, rivers, initial vegetation polygons with CEGL codes, and points of interest superimposed on CIR photographs. They also used a Trimble Geo 6000 Xh Global Positioning System (GPS) handheld receiver loaded with similar GIS layers. On some trips, an Apple iPad 4 with a geoPDF (Wuthrich 2006; Pardue 2008) replaced paper field maps. The geoPDF gave the user both a higher level of detail of the original CIR compared paper maps, along with the ability to determine location in real time using the device’s internal GPS relative to the overlay of the line work.