Introduction Overview Role of Analysis Inventory & Monitoring Types of Monitoring Components of a Plan Setting Up a Plan Monitoring Methods What Worked? Glossary & References Contributors Links Forms & Tools

Inventory and Monitoring Complete draft (*.pdf) TYPES OF MONITORING Implementation Implementation monitoring, which takes place during and immediately after road decommissioning, asks the fundamental question: Did we do what we said we were going to do? During the project, implementation monitoring identifies the suitability of the project design for that particular area. Implementation sets the stage for other types of monitoring. (Kershner 1997) Effectiveness The primary purpose of effectiveness monitoring is to determine whether resource objectives were met. (Kershner 1997) To do so, monitoring must explore spatial, temporal, dynamics, and management context. The spatial component of monitoring requires choosing the scale of future management and policy decisions. The temporal component helps identify when monitors can detect change. Dynamics refers to the different processes that shape the ecosystem and the ease of observing the changes. Explicit dynamics are easily observable while implicit are not as easily observable. In addition, the team needs to define the temporal occurrence of processes as "continuous", "pulsed", "chaotic", or "random". For example, the team may note that road density has changed sediment delivery to streams, or that road density has changed the frequency of pulses from landslides.

The interdisciplinary team can use table 1 as a checklist of questions to ask when developing a road decommissioning monitoring plan. This format helps the team identify what they do understand about the system and it can clarify the sideboards of a monitoring plan. Table 1. Pertinenet questions in the development of an ecosystem monitoring plan (Maddox et al., 1999) (Modified from Quattrochi and Pelietier, 1991) Questions of Space What is there? -Species composition -Community types present: their absolute and relative abundance -Land cover attribute (e.g., forest, field, urban) -Terrain attributes (e.g. topography) What is the pattern of ecosystems attributes? What is the spatial scale required for management and policy decisions? Questions of Time What are the temporal dynamics of ecosystem components? What are the temporal scales of changes in ecosystem components? What are the temporal scales of the effects of management? Questions of Dynamics What kinds of processes shape the ecosystem? -Explicit (i.e., easily observable) -Implicit (i.e., not easily observable) -Natural (i.e., undisturbed) -Uncontrolled disturbances (e.g., exotic species) -Controlled disturbances (e.g., resource harvest, controlled burning) Temporal occurrence of these processes -Continuous -Pulsed -Chaotic or random Biological levels that reflect or indicate these processes -Population dynamics -Community composition -Spatial arrangement -Ecosystem process (e.g., nutrient cycling) -Statistical index (e.g. “Index of Biological Integrity”) Questions of Management What are the human uses? What are the management goals? What are the reporting requirements (i.e., what kind of information is known to be critical for policy making and reporting to the public?) Trend Trend monitoring reflects the change of an indicator over time, a less rigorous form of effectiveness monitoring, trend monitoring usually involves visual estimates or photographs rather than absolute measures. Validation Validation monitoring more closely linked to research, verifies the basic assumptions behind the monitoring. Validation monitoring is a research tool with which the team can examine the basic scientific understanding of how systems work. Tracking Tracking is the collection of data to record accomplishments, and identify future projects. The Forest Service has developed spatial and tabular databases INFRASTRUCTURE (INFRA) and Natural Resource Information System (NRIS) to track the spatial and tabular components of road decommissioning and watershed restoration. The NRIS and INFRA programs are Oracle databases. Both database systems are being refined and improved, so that teams can better capture the important details of road decommissioning work. Good reporting enables the USDA Forest Service to monitor the effectiveness of road decommissioning and to share this information both internally and externally. NRIS contains analysis tools that focus on data from several natural resource areas including soils and water. When completed, NRIS can integrate resource information systems for meeting the agency’s resource inventory and monitoring needs. NRIS will support field-level users on national forests with a common set of basic data and data standards, in a common computing environment. NRIS gives everyone access to data used for natural resource decisionmaking. NRIS will continue to develop over the next couple of years and will help to track and spatially record watershed improvement. (NRIS Web site)