Each site has approximately 50 permanent vegetation plots, surveyed approximately every 4 years. Plots are 2 × 2 m2 and are divided into 25 cells. Presence of vegetation species (vascular plants, bryophytes, and lichens at some sites) is recorded for each cell, and % cover is recorded for each species at the plot level. Other information collected includes slope and aspect of the plot, bare ground, vegetation height etc. Additional information about tree species is collected over larger plots (10 × 10 m2) within woodlands. See the protocols below for detailed information.
Permanent plot numbers and locations should generally be consistent between surveys. If a previously installed feno marker could not be found at a subsequent survey it is likely to have been replaced by a new feno marker at the same GPS coordinates. This is indicated in the data by the plot number changing from e.g. ‘2’ to ‘2a’. This is most likely to have occurred before high accuracy GPS units were available on the surveys and therefore where coordinate accuracy might have been several metres, but we suspect that some feno markers have been deliberately removed or, in some substrates, have been covered over. High accuracy GPS coordinates are now available for most plots.
The species datasets published on this page include all species records (except lichens) from the 2 × 2 m2 plots. The plot dataset includes all plot and site identifiers as well as the location information (Eastings/Northings, latitude/longitude, and British National Grid coordinates). All other data (tree data and non-species plot data) is available from the core sites data pages, but will soon also be available in compiled datasets.
This page is part of Natural England’s Long Term Monitoring Network.