).
Traditional fish, wildlife, and plant management has focused on individual species. Many individual species are still of interest for their ecological, esthetic, economic, social, or other values and have a large literature base. However, communities, a system of plants and animals living together and linked by their interactions with each other and with their environment, move us a step closer to working at an ecosystem level.
· Loss of habitat for species with large area needs.
· Loss of habitat for many species even without large area needs, e.g., those that require a succession stage that is not usually a target of management.
· Recognition of the importance of spatial patterns, habitat fragmentation, and barriers on physical and genetic interchange among individuals.
· Interest in maintenance of regional biological diversity and processes.
Communities are commonly defined and delineated by vegetation, hydrology, topography, or a combination of factors. Communities can be described by their structure, function/processes, composition, and/or pattern. There are advantages and disadvantages to focusing on communities.
Elements or activities such as inventory, management, etc., are less easily described for communities than for species. Any one document on a particular community will commonly include a description (taxonomic and perhaps structural), distribution and status, importance of the community (functions, wildlife components, economic value, etc.), and management practices or effects.
An
excellent overview of communities and why they are of concern is provided in
a report titled "Endangered Ecosystems of the United States: A Preliminary
Assessment of Loss and Degradation" http://biology.usgs.gov/pubs/ecosys.htm.
That document is reproduced here (
).
Similar documents covering just aquatic systems are available from the Freshwater Initiative of The Nature Conservancy: http://www.freshwaters.org/ccwp/home.html. The buttons for Water Science and Water Lessons contain especially relevant files and links.
Several of the nine approaches to classification profiled in EMRIS lead to a map or description of communities. Gap analysis, classification on a state-wide basis, is a continuing process with completed products placed on-line, including maps and analyses. Search http://www.gap.uidaho.edu/ for an area of interest. An aquatic component of Gap analysis is beginning in Missouri, New York, West Virginia, and Oregon: http://www.gap.uidaho.edu/Projects/Aquatic/default.htm.
The Northern Prairie Wildlife research center of the U.S. Geologic Survey is primarily responsible for a series of searchable databases on various communities:
Wetland: http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/literatr/wetresto/wetresto.htm
Savanna: http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/literatr/savanna/savanna.htm
Riparian (primarily the west) http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/literatr/riparian/riparian.htm
This document is a review of riparian ecosystem creation and restoration: http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/literatr/ripareco/ripareco.htm#contents and includes a chapter on the status of riparian systems. The review covers material through 1988 for the United States, although data coverage is spotty.
Local and regional descriptions of systems will provide the best information. These can be accessed through the knowledge of co-workers, literature searches, chapters of Native Plant Societies, The Nature Conservancy, and state agencies. The contents of EMRIS on community information are not comprehensive, they just furnish an idea of what is available. Click on the sites listed at the end of the Relevant Information section above for a particular location for a selection of community information available on the Web. Most of the sites will require some browsing, but there will almost always be a payoff.
One illustration of the value of community documents is actually a paper on an ecosystem: "Tidal Marshes of Long Island Sound: Ecology, History, and Restoration," found at http://camel2.conncoll.edu/ccrec/greennet/arbo/publications/34/FRAME.HTM.
Delaware http://www.delanet.com/~dnpswp/pcom.htm
Minnesota and Wisconsin http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/1998/mnplant/mnplant.htm
California http://www.cnps.org/vegetation/vegindex.htm and http://www.calpoly.edu/~dchippin/zonation.html#top
Colorado http://cnap.state.co.us/features.html
Colorado and western US http://redgarden.cr.usgs.gov/pcrs/PCRS_Announcement.htm
Florida http://www.fnps.org/naturalhistorial/habitat.html
North central United States http://159.189.96.215/resource/type_L.htm
Intermountain west http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/literatr/riparian/riparian.htm
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service National Wetlands Research Center in Lafayette, LA, prepared a series of reports on the natural history of selected communities across the country. Some have been scanned and placed on the Web. Even though the literature base is now several years old, these reports provide an excellent overview of the physical and biological aspects of a community. Click on the Division names on the map to find a list of those that are relevant for a Division. The publications are listed here and the Web site for those that are electronic is http://www.nwrc.usgs.gov/pblctns2.html, or users can find their way there via http://www.nwrc.usgs.gov/.
If you cannot obtain a publication from the National Wetlands Research Center, contact Jean O'Neil to request a scanned copy by EMAIL at L.JEAN.O'NEIL@ERDC.USACE.ARMY.MIL.
