Integrated Upland Vegetation and Soils Monitoring for Glen Canyon National Recreation Area: 2008 Summary Report
DeCoster JK and Swan MC. 2009. Integrated Upland Vegetation and Soils Monitoring for Glen Canyon National Recreation Area: 2008 Summary Report. Natural Resource Data Series. NPS/SCPN/NRDS—2009/017. National Park Service Natural Resource Program Center. Fort Collins, Colorado
The Southern Colorado Plateau Network (SCPN) is monitoring vegetation and soils as overall indicators of upland ecosystem integrity. The SCPN Upland Monitoring crew began monitoring at Glen Canyon National Recreation Area (GLCA) in 2008 with the establishment of ten plots in the Desert Sand ecological site. Field methodology is provided in detail in the SCPN Integrated Upland Protocol (DeCoster et al., in review). These data represent the first year baseline of sampling for the Desert Sand ecological site at GLCA. The site was dominated by a diverse mixture of shrubs. The potential for erosion at the Desert Sand ecological site is high because of its extensive areas occupied by large basal gaps, the low amount of biological crusts, and the low soil aggregate stability. The SCPN Integrated Upland crew plans to sample the quadrats and gap intercept transects annually for 3-5 years to determine the range of variability for key metrics. Power analysis will then be used to determine the total number of plots necessary to detect change in the key metrics. When the current soil survey is complete, the sampling frame will be extended to include the entire of the Desert Sand ecological site that meets the sampling criteria within the park. A temporal sampling design will then be implemented, with the installation of additional plots in subsequent years. Each year’s data will be compared with the previously collected data to analyze changes through time in vegetation composition and structure and in soil stability and hydrologic function.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- DeCoster, James; Swan, Megan
- Date of Issue
- 2009-12
- Publisher
- National Park Service Natural Resource Program Center
- Units
- GLCA , NRSS , SCPN
- Keywords
- Abundance (Biodiversity), Desert Sand ecological site, Monitoring, Observations, Presence (Biodiversity), Soils, Taxa Links To Datasets, upland ecosystems, Vegetation, Vouchers