Proposed Protocol For A Rare Plant Survey In The Lower Foothills Northern East Slopes

This document presents the climatic, physiographic, vegetation, soil, wildlife and land use attributes that characterize each natural region and subregion. It has been organized into four parts: part one outlines national region and subregion concepts, part two describes methods used to generate climate statistics, part three presents a comparative analysis of selected climate statistics to facilitate comparison of natural regions and subregions, and part four presents detailed climatic, vegetation, soils and physiographic descriptions for six natural regions and twenty-one natural subregions currently recognized in Alberta.

An ecological classification system was developed for Northern Alberta through the analysis of vegetation, soil, site, and forest productivity information. The hierarchical classification system has three levels - ecosite, ecosite phase and plant community type. Thirty-eight ecosites are described with further detail provided by subdivision into ecosite and ecosite phase and plant community type. A soil type classification system that describes 17 soil types was also developed. Management interpretations were made for drought, excess moisture, soil rutting hazard, soil compaction hazard, puddling hazard, soil erosion hazard, frost heave hazard, soil temperature limitations, vegetation competition, and windthrow hazard. Colour photos and drawings for 87 common plants of northern Alberta are presented.

Measuring and Monitoring Biological Diversity is the first book to provide comprehensive coverage of standard methods for biodiversity sampling of amphibians, with information on analyzing and using data that will interest biologists in general. In this manual, nearly fifty herpetologists recommend ten standard sampling procedures for measuring and monitoring amphibian and many other populations. The contributors discuss each procedure, along with the circumstances for its appropriate use. In addition, they provide a detailed protocol for each procedure's implementation, a list of necessary equipment and personnel, and suggestions for analyzing the data. The data obtained using these standard methods are comparable across sites and through time and, as a result, are extremely useful for making decisions about habitat protection, sustained use, and restoration—decisions that are particularly relevant for threatened amphibian populations.

This technical reference applies to monitoring situations involving a single plant species, such as an indicator species, key species, or weed. It was originally developed for monitoring special status plants, which have some recognized status at the Federal, State, or agency level because of their rarity or vulnerability. Most examples and discussions in this technical reference focus on these special status species, but the methods described are also applicable to any single-species monitoring and even some community monitoring situations.We thus hope wildlife biologists, range conservationists, botanists, and ecologists will all find this technical reference helpful.