releve Virginia Division of Natural Heritage, see http://www.dcr.virginia.gov/natural_heritage/documents/nh_plotform_instructions.pdf
Overall Taxon Cover Values are Automatically Calculated?
no
Plot Quality Fields:
Plot Validation Level
(2) classification plot: sufficient for inclusion in a classification revision
Overall Plot Vegetation Fields:
Field Height
7
m
Field Cover
100
%
Misc Fields:
Observation Narrative
This extraordinary and enigmatic stand appears to represent natural mafic prairie vegetation. The nearly complete absence of exotics (limited to a narrow zone along the Parkway) and dominance by native warm-season grasses suggest a naturally occurring community. Species characteristic of mafic soils include Parthenium auriculatum (which is more abundant than supporting plot data indicate) Scleria pauciflora, and Rhynchospora recognita. Akers Meadow also supports a known population of Lilium believed to represent a hybrid between grayi and canadense; only vegetative individuals were observed during the 2003 survey. Intensive examination revealed moderately high cover of diminutive, vegetative culms of what appears to be Festuca rubra, the nativity of which at this site is uncertain. Additional survey earlier in the growing season will be needed to confidently determine the identity of several Carex and Rhynchospora species. Many constituents of this community also occur in barrens at Buffalo Mountain, including Schizachyrium, Andropogon, Sorghastrum, Scleria, Symphyotrichum, Polygala sanguinea, and Salix humilis. Vegetation bears only superficial resemblance to a putative mesic/wet-mesic prairie in Floyd County. Further investigation into the history, dynamics and edaphic characteristics of this site is warranted. It is not obvious how this stand, which occupies ca. 1500 sq. m, is maintained in open condition, other than by edaphic stress and resistance to woody invasion. Periodic mowing almost certainly takes place, but stature of flowering stems of Silphium trifoliatum (1.5+ m) in 2003 suggests that the site had not been mowed in that growing season. Composition varies along an apparent hydrologic gradient; distinct seepage areas at both the eastern and western ends contain such species as Lilium, Melanthium virginicum, Symplocarpus foetidus, and Elymus virginicus. No seepage zones are evident at the ground surface, but soil is heavily mottled below 60 cm, where it appears to be a sandy clay loam. This site lacks patches of exposed gravel substrate characteristic of woodlands at The Glades in Grayson County, which support similarly high cover of warm-season grasses, although one discrete opening, perhaps of animal origin, occupying only a few square meters observed, and gravel abounds in the subsoil at a depth of 25-30 cm. In addition presumably remnant clumps of Schizachyrium scoparium were observed in the much larger grazed pasture on the other side of the Blue Ridge Parkway. It may be that this community was formerly both more extensive and wetter at the surface, before the Parkway was built and bisected the community. It is possible that fill was deposited to create a crown for the road surface and that an originally braided channel that supplied seepage to the still intact prairie was largely diverted through the culvert that runs underneath the road near the southwestern end of the community, which together fragmented the site and resulted in a significant change in hydrology.
Plot locations was selected in the field by DNH Ecologists.
Soil data from sample collected in 2004 survey. Additional species recorded in 2003 include Packera anonyma, Rhynchospora cf. glomerata, Rhynchospora recognita, Carex gracillima, Carex hirsutella, Carex bushii, Coreopsis pubescens, Cirsium muticum, and cf. Helianthus maximiliani.
