There is strong demand for information about the status of, and trends in, Australia's biodiversity. Almost inevitably, this demand for information has led to demand for a broad-scale monitoring system. However, the decision to embark on a monitoring system should only be made once it has been established that a monitoring system is the optimal way to inform management. We stress the need to invest resources in assessing whether a monitoring system is necessary before committing resources to the design and implementation of the system. Current debate associated with the design of a biodiversity monitoring system has similarities to the debate within the range management profession in the early 1970s. The experience with range monitoring shows that large-scale monitoring systems such as those being proposed will require considerable resources, recurrently expended into the distant future, but with only a limited ability to adapt to new demands. Those involved in any biodiversity monitoring system will need to understand the implications of investing in a long-term monitoring programme. Monitoring sustainability will only be possible if the monitoring system is itself sustainable. We discuss a number of issues that need to be addressed before the system is at all sustainable. These attributes are a mix of biophysical, social and institutional attributes and highlight the view that monitoring systems of the type being suggested comprise an unusual mixture of attributes not found in typical scientific activity. The present paper is not a technical manual, but rather considers some of the design issues associated with designing and implementing large-scale monitoring systems.
The Western Australian Rangeland Monitoring System (WARMS) consists of a set of ~1620 permanent sites distributed across the pastoral rangelands of Western Australia used for commercial livestock grazing. The system is designed to provide information to government and the general community on changes in Western Australia’s rangelands, rather than to individual landholders. It is designed to report at the regional or vegetation type level by selectively sampling representative areas of the rangelands, with representation occurring at several levels. The system was fully implemented by 1999 and all sites, except a small number of ongoing replacements, have now been re-assessed at least once. Two site types are used. In grassland areas, the frequency of all perennial species is assessed, and an estimate made of crown cover of woody perennials. In shrubland areas, a direct census technique is used, with the demography and maximum canopy dimensions of all shrubs recorded. Changes in soil surface condition and patch distribution are also assessed using standard Landscape Function Analysis (LFA) techniques. The vegetation and soil surface information is used to indicate rangeland change. The system is not fixed within any single model of range dynamics and the outputs of WARMS can be interpreted in various ways, depending on the specific requirements of the end-user. The paper includes discussion of the institutional requirements for WARMS, the site stratification and selection criteria, description of the field methods used and the rationale behind its design. It also considers the implications of the site stratification and selection criteria in terms of the caveats that need to accompany reporting.
Thresholds and transitions between vegetation states are accepted components of models of rangeland dynamics. By definition, transitions represent changes from one state to another that are enduring, and are unlikely to be reversed within an acceptable management time frame or without significant inputs of management. A monitoring dataset, containing 306 grassland sites and 919 shrubland sites, was used to identify transitions that have occurred in the pastoral rangelands of Western Australia between 1993 and 2010. The grassland sites were assessed on five occasions and the shrubland sites on three occasions. Transition between vegetation states was assessed using the expert knowledge of the authors. A total of 11% of the grassland sites and 1% of the shrubland sites were determined to have undergone a transition, negative as well as positive from a pastoral perspective, over the sampling period. It is argued that, once a transition has occurred, both pastoral managers and government regulators need to adjust to the new conditions, altering management to best address the new state and altering regulatory expectations so that range condition is assessed within the context of the current state and its further capacity to change.
The Western Australian Rangeland Monitoring System (WARMS), a state government monitoring activity, provides information on change in Western Australia’s pastoral rangelands. It consists of a set of permanent sites, on which measurements of perennial vegetation (direct census in shrublands and perennial grass frequency and woody cover in grasslands) and assessments of soil surface condition are recorded at either 3-year (grasslands) or 5-year (shrublands) intervals. Data collection is non-destructive. Site distribution is based on vegetation type, and WARMS reports at the vegetation type or regional level, not individual site or property level. Operating WARMS requires a range of defined conventions to ensure that personnel changes and the interval between samplings at any one site do not lead to confounding of results through variation in how data are collected. The number of sites (1622) and program timeframe (decadal) mean that data storage and management issues are critical. Data interpretation, including the interpretive framework and use of ancillary data to assist in interpreting causality, and provision of information products relevant to a range of users are also important operational aspects. A companion paper addresses the institutional requirements for WARMS, system design and the rationale behind this design.
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