Vegetation Community Monitoring Protocol for the Heartland Inventory and Monitoring Network

Vegetation community monitoring in the HTLN parks is designed to detect and describe changes in prairie, savanna-woodland and forested communities. There are three primary objectives for the monitoring defined in this protocol: 1. Describe the species composition, structure and diversity of prairie, savanna-woodland and forested communities; 2. Determine temporal changes in the species composition, structure and diversity of prairie, savanna-woodland and forested communities; 3. Determine the relationship between temporal and spatial changes and environmental variables including specific management practices.