Site: SCBI Dendrometer
Country: USA
Site PI: William McShea , Norman Bourg, Kristina Anderson-Teixeira
Data Type:
Availabilty: Immediate
About Data: The SCBI Forest Dynamics Plot is located at the Smithsonian National Zoological Park’s Conservation Biology Institute facility in Front Royal, VA, adjacent to the northern end of Shenandoah National Park. The SCBI is also the core site for the Mid-Atlantic domain (Domain 2) of the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON), and the SCBI plot lies at the intersection of three of the major physiographic provinces of this region: the Blue Ridge, Ridge and Valley, and Piedmont provinces. The forest type is typical mature secondary eastern mixed deciduous forest, with a canopy dominated by tulip poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera), hickories (Carya spp.), oaks (Quercus spp.), and white ash (Fraxinus americana), and an understory composed mainly of spicebush (Lindera benzoin), paw-paw (Asimina triloba), American hornbeam (Carpinus caroliniana) and eastern redbud (Cercis canadensis). It is classified as Upper Piedmont/Northern Blue Ridge Basic Mesic Hardwood Forest in the U.S. National Vegetation Classification system (USNVC code CEGL006186).
The PIs of the SCBI Plot seek to promote scientific study and exploration in the field of forest ecology and global change science. The 25.6-ha SCBI Plot stem census data and a number of ancillary plot datasets are freely available for non-commercial scientific use if prospective users agree to the Terms and Conditions herein described. The initial stem census data and some ancillary datasets have been published (see Bourg, N.A., W.J. McShea, J.R. Thompson, J.C. McGarvey, and X. Shen. 2013. Initial census, woody seedling, seed rain, and stand structure data for the SCBI SIGEO Large Forest Dynamics Plot. Ecology 94(9): 2111-2112. http://dx.doi.org/10.1890/13-0010.1). All plot datasets are the result of a large investment of human and financial resources. The PIs also encourage researchers to contact them with ideas and proposals for collaborative research projects utilizing the data available here and other data that can be requested from the PIs.