Rare Riparian Plant Community Monitoring Protocol

Vital Signs: Rare, Riparian Plant Communities including “Riverscour” plant communities
Protocol will be implemented: DEWA, UPDE, NERI, GARI, and BLUE

Justification/Issue being addressed:
The ERMN, with more than 211 miles of river, contains diverse, unique, and globally significant plant communities associated with the floodplains and other geomorphic and hydrologic features of large rivers. The network is currently developing conceptual ecological models for riparian plant communities in general, and nine plant communities will be given special emphasis, due to their rarity and/or the presence of rare species.

Principal investigators and NPS lead: Matt Marshall, ERMN Coordinator, will be the lead NPS contact. The ERMN currently does not have a cooperator for protocol development, however the ERMN is collaborating with Dr. Greg Podniesinski, Western Pennsylvania Conservancy, on conceptual ecological model development for these plant communities. Draft conceptual models and a workshop to review and discuss these models, as well move into objective-setting for protocol development, is expected to occur soon.