| Abstract Detail
Floristics & Taxonomy Sheik, Matthew [1], Weeks, Andrea [1]. Floristic Checklist of Shenandoah River State Park (SHSP) Warren Co., Virginia. Opening in 1999, Shenandoah River State Park (SHSP) encompasses 1619 acres of the northern Shenandoah Valley between the Massanutten Mountains and Shenandoah National Park in Warren County, VA. This region has a long history of modification by humans from Native American settlement to colonization by European farmers. SHSP contains 12 unique ecosystem types that span 165 – 869 masl from S1 ranked inland wetlands and river scour communities to upland forests including G2/S2 ranked, endemic Appalachian shale barrens. Warren County ranks last in total herbarium specimens collected, scaled for area, and total plant taxa recorded (n = 1172 spp. and subspp.) of the five northern Shenandoah Valley counties. With such a diversity in plant communities and a sparse collection history, a floristic checklist of SHSP will likely uncover rare and unique species in need of conservation. Presently, the Virginia Natural Heritage Program monitors two populations of rare species, Eaton’s Lipfern Cheilanthes eatonii (ranked S2) and Torrey’s Rush Juncus torreyi (ranked S1). Specimen collection at SHSP will continue throughout 2021 and 2022 and will be documented in iNaturalist to connect with the larger community and augment herbarium records. We estimate that this project will document 550 – 600 plant taxa, whose data will be shared through the SERNEC Symbiota portal and will deposit ca. 1200 herbarium specimens in GMUF and UNC. We anticipate that this checklist will not only be useful to the many stakeholders of SHSP – and engage the community of users on iNaturalist – but will make substantive contributions to our understanding of the flora of Virginia.
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Related Links:
The iNaturalist Project Page
1 - George Mason University, Department of Biology and the Ted R. Bradley Herbarium, Fairfax, VA, 22030, USA
Keywords:
Flora
Floristics
Checklist
Virginia.
Presentation Type: Poster
Session: P2, Floristics & Taxonomy Posters
Location: Virtual/Virtual
Date: Tuesday, July 20th, 2021
Time: 5:00 PM(EDT)
Number: P2FT009
Abstract ID:824
Candidate for Awards:None |
