Overview and compatibility of Northern Territory plot-based vegetation data with the National Vegetation Classification System and future vegetation typologies

Abstract

Plot-based vegetation data have been collected in the Northern Territory since the 1950s. The purpose of data collection broadly includes land resource and vegetation community mapping, flora surveys, habitat assessment for fauna surveys, rare and threatened species surveys, development assessment and monitoring. These datasets were stored in disparate database systems until 2012. Currently over 423 surveys, 69 000 geocoded plots, comprising almost 838 164 flora records, are maintained using a corporate database. The data are of varying degrees of attribute detail including floristics, structure, strata and associated environmental information. The original territory-wide standardised vegetation classification was based on the 1:1 000 000 vegetation mapping project where 112 broad vegetation types were described from 2245 plots using an intuitive appraisal of numerical analytical techniques. This approach continues to be used; however, a standard method would be desirable to classify plot data into meaningful vegetation types in the Northern Territory. The National Vegetation Information System (vegetation hierarchy) was used to qualitatively assess the level of detail of vegetation plot data. Only 9% of the plot data can be assigned to sub-association level, and 28% to the association level. In addition to reviewing the compatibility of plot data to the National Vegetation Information System, we also provide examples of how it can conform with the International Vegetation Classification.