New South Wales Vegetation Classification & Assessment Database Project (NSWVCA)

Dr John Benson - Senior Plant Ecologist assisted by  Dr Chris Allen - Senior Technical Officer

Senior Plant Ecologist John Benson instigated the NSWVCA database project in 1999 to meet an increasing demand for a fine-thematic level ecological (vegetation) classification covering NSW for environmental assessment and ecosystem management. The NSWVCA is classifying the vegetation of NSW into plant communities based on the best existing data, extensive field checking and expert review. Feedback to the classification helps with revisions with each new publication.

As of 2010, 585 communities were classified in the database covering the inland NSW Slopes and Plains and the west New England Bioregion.

In March 2011 the NSWVCA database was made web accessible and users can register to use it via the OEH Vegetation Information System (VIS) web page.

About the project

A standard vegetation classification of the 80 million hectare State of New South Wales, Australia is required to assist with environmental assessment and ecosystem management under environmental laws and regulations.

The aim of the NSWVCA project is to classify and assess the threat and protected area status of the native vegetation of NSW (Benson 2006). A brief overview of the vegetation in NSW is provided in the Setting the Scene PDF paper on this website (Benson 1999). Broadly classified vegetation classes and formations are described in the book From Ocean Shores to Desert Dunes by David Keith (2004). Each plant community described in the NSWVCA database cross-references to the broad 'Formation Groups' in the book The Vegetation of Australia by Beadle (1981) and to the 99 Vegetation Classes described in Keith (2004).

Descriptions of each NSWVCA classified plant community are provided on the NSWVCA database bio-information system that is being published as new versions as the project progresses from western to eastern NSW. A copy of a read-only version of the NSWVCA database is provided on a CD/DVD in the back pocket of the journal publications and can be obtained by land mail from NSWVCA, Ecology Section, Royal Botanic Gardens & Domain Trust, Mrs Macquaries Road, Sydney NSW 2000.

The NSWVCA project mirrors the National Vegetation Classification of the United States (Jennings et al. 2006) that was initiated by The Nature Conservancy (Grossman et al. 1998).

It is anticipated that when all of the vegetation in NSW is classified through the NSWVCA project, between 1400 and 1600 plant communities will be classified, described and assessed. To date, 585 plant communities have been or are in the process of being published covering 11.5 of the 18 IBRA bioregions in NSW. These include all bioregions west of the Great Dividing Range. Work has commenced to classify and describe the plant communities in the South East Highlands and Australian Alps Bioregions in south-eastern NSW.

The NSWVCA mainly relies on published and unpublished vegetation type data to develop a fine thematic level State-wide vegetation 'type' vegetation classification. To date over 530 references have been cited in the plant community descriptions. These references are listed in the NSWVCA Bibliography on the CD/DVDs associated with the publications. The vegetation data assessed includes spatial data (vegetation maps), associated descriptions of map units, floristic classifications derived from cluster or other analysis of floristic plot data, descriptions of vegetation types in reports and papers and expert advice (see flow diagram). Extensive field checking helps validate and compare disparate information. Quantitative analyses based on adequate sampling of environmental variation are favoured where they are available but sound quantitative data are patchy west of the Great Dividing Range in NSW, whereas these data are more abundant on the coast and eastern tablelands. The classification aims to list plant communities at the 'plant association' level that takes into account significant canopy and understorey floristic variation.

Each plant community is recorded in an MS Access database that contains 90 fields of information, 47 Tables and 64 forms. The fields are described in Appendix A in Benson (2006) provided at his web site in the 'Database Description' file. The threat criteria used to assess the risk of each listed plant community are included in Appendix B of Benson (2006) - see the file 'Threat Criteria' on this web site.

The NSWVCA database fields include: lists of characteristic species in three strata, vegetation structure, common name, scientific name, general description, photographs, references that form a basis of the classification or assessment, distribution by bioregions, local government area and other regions, soils and substrate, list of threatening processes, comments on condition, fire regimes if known, a IUCN-like threat code using criteria about remaining extent and condition, a protected area code based on relative extent protected in reserves or secure property agreements.

The NSWVCA database contains different 20 reports for listing plant communities by geographical regions or under broader vegetation classifications. PDF reports contain images while MS Word reports contain text only. The query mode in the full version of the database facilitates a range of queries of combinations of the 90 fields in the database.

Results are being published in refereed papers and placed on this web site to attract use and feedback of the NSWVCA scheme. Major changes to the classification are published on this web site.

The results of this project are pertinent to:

• site assessment for property planning and environmental impact assessment
• setting priorities in regional planning
• a basis for mapping vegetation
• selecting new conservation reserves and private property conservation agreements
• monitoring progress in protecting biodiversity
• managing different types of vegetation
• public education about the vegetation of NSW

   An overview of the vegetation of NSW can be gleaned from ‘Setting the Scene: the native vegetation of New South Wales’ (859 Kb pdf file)

Progress of the NSW Vegetation Classification and Assessment Project (NSWVCA) March 2011

Four papers on the NSWVCA have been published in the Royal Botanic Gardens & Domain Trust, Sydney ecological journal Cunninghamia. PDFs of the NSWVCA papers are attached to this web site broken into sections for downloading (due to the large size of the papers). The actual NSWVCA database cannot be downloaded from this website  The CD containing the database and various pdf reports is available by land mail on request to the Ecology Section, Royal  Botanic Gardens & Domain Trust, Sydney . A web version of the VCA database is now available through the DECCW Vegetation Information System web site.

Paper 1 Introduction to the NSWVCA classification and database

Paper 1 (Benson 2006) was published in Cunninghamia Volume 9(3) in June 2006. It summarises vegetation classification and mapping internationally, in Australia and in New South Wales. It describes the NSWVCA’s scope and methods, the NSWVCA database fields and reports, the NSWVCA threat criteria used to assess the threat status of each plant community into IUCN-like threat categories and the protected area threshold rules used to assess the protected area status of each plant community. A number of maps show planning and administrative regions in NSW are included in this publication.

Paper 2 The plant communities of the NSW Western Plains and Version 1 of the NSWVCA database

The second NSWVCA paper (Benson et al. 2006) published in Cunninghamia Volume 9(3) in June 2006, describes 213 plant communities of the NSW Western Plains, a geographical area covering 57% of NSW including the semi-arid and arid regions of the State (see the image of NSW divided into four sections). This section of NSW is defined by eight IBRA Bioregions defined in version 6 of Thackway & Cresswell (1995).being the Murray-Darling Depression, Riverina, Broken Hill Complex, Cobar Peneplain, Simpson-Strzelecki Dunefields, Channel Country, Mulga Lands and Darling Riverine Plains Bioregions. The section completely covers the Western and Lower Murray-Darling Catchment Management Authority areas and the western parts of six other CMAs running westwards off the Great Dividing Range.

Full descriptions of the 213 plant communities of the NSW Western Plains are included in a document 640 A4 pages long on the CD accompanying Paper 1 (Benson et al. 2006). Other PDF reports from the database covering CMA areas and bioregions are on the CD accompanying the Cunninghamia 9(3) journal publication. The CD also contains a read only version of the NSWVCA NSW Western Plains database that allows the user to generate reports. The publication can be obtained from the Ecology Section, Royal Botanic Gardens & Domain Trust, Mrs Macquaries Rd, Sydney NSW 2000, or by emailing NSWVCA@rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au. Note that Version 2 of the NSWVCA database added five extra plant communities to the NSW Western Plains, Version 3 adds two more so there are now 220 plant communities listed for the NSW Western Plains.

Paper 3 Version 2 of the NSWVCA database adding the NSW South-western Slopes Bioregion to the NSW Western Plains

The third NSWVCA paper (Benson 2008) published in Cunninghamia 10(4) in December 2008, classifies and describes the vegetation in the NSW South-western Slopes Bioregion which is a mainly cleared and fragmented farming region covering 10% of NSW. In total, 135 plant communities are described for the NSW SWS Bioregion. 97 of these were additions to Version 1 that partly covered the Lower Slopes sub-region of the NSWSWS Bioregion. The description of the 135 plant communities in the NSW South-western Slopes Bioregion is about 400 A4 pages long and is on the CD as part of the publication. Version 3 includes and extra 11 plant communities in the NSW SW Slopes Bioregion bringing the total for that bioregion to 145 as of 2011.

Paper 4: Version 3 of the NSWVCA database adding the Brigalow Belt South, Nandewar and west-New England Bioregions to the NSW south West Slopes and Western Plains

The fourth NSWVCA paper (Benson et al. 2010) classifies and describes the vegetation in the Brigalow Belt South, Nandewar and west-New England Bioregions covering 9.3 million hectares including all of the NSW North Western Slopes. This covers the sandstone forests near Dubbo, the Pilliga Scrub, Yetman forests, Warrumbungle Range, Mount Kaputar, Liverpool Range, Liverpool Plains, dry rainforest types on the north western slopes, west New England acid volcanic and granite landscapes and some New England Tableland woodlands and tall forests. In total, 315 plant communities are described. 273 of these are additions to Version 2 of the NSWVCA. The description of the 315 plant communities in the NSW South-western Slopes Bioregion is about 920 A4 pages long and is on the DVD as part of the publication.

Other notes

• As of August 2010, over 530 references on vegetation have been incorporated into the NSWVCA Bibliography in the NSWVCA database. There has been over 60,000 km of field traverse and over 2000 vegetation field checks during which plant species, abiotic features and GPS readings are recorded and photographs taken.
• A collection of about 20,000 photographs NSW Western Plains and NSW South-western Slopes Bioregion plant communities has been established at the Royal Botanic Gardens & Domain Trust.
• Four of the 13 NSW Catchment Management Authority Areas are covered in full by the NSWVCA being: Western, Lower Murray-Darling, Border Rivers/Gwydir and Namoi CMAs. Most the Murray, Murrumbidgee, Lachlan and Central West CMAs are also covered by the NSWVCA.

Threat and protected area status of plant communities in the NSW Western Plains

• Only 3.9% of the NSW Western Plains is represented in protected areas (public conservation reserves and secure long term property agreements) compared to 14% for the eastern half of NSW.
• Only one of the eight Western Plains Bioregions has greater than 10% of its area in protected areas.
• 31 or 15% of the plant communities are not recorded from protected areas;
• 136 or 64% have less than 5% of their pre-European extent in protected areas.
• Only 52 or 24% of the communities have greater than 10% of their original extent protected, thus meeting international guidelines for representation of ecological communities in protected areas.
• 71 or 33% of the plant communities are threatened, that is, judged as being ‘critically endangered’, ‘endangered’ or ‘vulnerable’.
• This audit of the protected areas in western NSW demonstrates that the current protected area system is inadequate and that more conservation reserves and secure property agreements are required to attain minimum international thresholds for representation of landscapes in protected areas.
• Threatening processes include clearing of woodlands and grasslands in central-western NSW; weed invasion on floodplains; unsustainable grazing by domestic stock and feral animals - particularly by goats on semi-arid and arid rocky ranges and rabbits on sandy rises in the Riverina; water draw off from rivers for irrigation preventing flooding of floodplains and threatening the floodplain communities; localised rises in salinity; and long term impacts of climate change on a range of key native plant species.

Threat and protected area status of the plant communities in the NSW South-western Slopes Bioregion

• 1.9% of the NSW SW Slopes Bioregion is in protected areas;
• 28 of the 135 plant communities were assessed as adequately represented in protected areas;
• Using the NSWVCA threat criteria, 18 plant communities were assessed as Critically Endangered, 33 Endangered, 29 Vulnerable, 25 Near threatened and 30 Least Concern;
• Threatening processes include: impacts of past over-clearing and habitat fragmentation on plant and animal species persistence in small remnants, dominance of exotic plant species in the ground cover of grassy woodlands - often associated with increased nitrogen levels due to fertilizer use, soil erosion on hills, overgrazing of some areas and possibly a lack of regeneration under stress of lower rainfall regimes due to climate change.

Threat and protected area status of plant communities in the NSW BBS, Nandewar and west-New England Bioregions

• 7.1% of the region is in protected areas;
• 144 or 46% of the 315 plant communities were assessed as adequately represented in protected areas;
• Using the NSWVCA threat criteria, 15 plant communities were assessed as Critically Endangered, 59 Endangered, 60 Vulnerable, 99 Near threatened and 82 Least Concern;
• Threatening processes include: impacts of clearing and cropping on grassy woodlands an native grasslands, logging of western ironbark and Callitris forests and high altitude forests, dieback of trees on the New England due to insect attack and on the western slopes due to water stress, the spread of Coolatai Grass (Hyparrhenia hirta) represents a major threat to grassy ecological communities.

Current program

Work is continuing on classifying and assessing the vegetation in the western South East Highlands and Australian Alps Bioregions covering about 4 million hectares. This should be completed by the end of 2012 and will form the basis for Version 4 of the NSWVCA. It is likely that this will add between 150 and 250 plant communities to the Version 3 classification. This would also result in a complete vegetation classification of the Murray, Murrumbidgee, Lachlan and Central West CMA areas. The DECCW North Division has commenced work on the NSWVCA for the NSW North Coast and east New England Bioregion with the North Coast heathlands already classified .

Development of international Ecosystem Risk Assessment Criteria for the World Conservation Union (IUCN)

Six risk assessment criteria are described in the NSWVCA (Benson 2006). These categorise each plant community into one of the IUCN threat categories: Critically Endangered, Endangered, Vulnerable, Near threatened or Least Concern. These NSWVCA criteria, along with a number of other risk assessment criteria from other countries, are being used to develop draft international risk assessment criteria for assessing the threat status of the world’s ecosystems. The World Conservation Union (IUCN) has established a working group to work on developing these criteria, initiated in 2008 with a resolution passed the same year at the 4th IUCN World Conservation Congress. Further meetings were held with in Washington DC in 2010 and 2011. A paper describing the IUCN risk assessment criteria is published (Rodriquez et al. 2011).

References

• Beadle, N.C.W. (1981) The vegetation of Australia (Cambridge University Press: Cambridge England).
• Benson, J.S. (1999) Setting the scene: the native vegetation of New South Wales. Background Paper No. 1 (Native Vegetation Advisory Council: Sydney).
• Benson, J.S. (2006) New South Wales Vegetation Classification and Assessment: Introduction - the classification, database, assessment of protected areas and threat status of plant communities. Cunninghamia 9(3): 331-382.
• Benson, J.S., Allen, C., Togher, C. & Lemmon, J. (2006) New South Wales Vegetation Classification and Assessment: Part 1 Plant communities of the NSW Western Plains. Cunninghamia 9(3): 383-451.
• Benson, J.S. (2008) New South Wales Vegetation Classification and Assessment: Part 2 Plant communities in the NSW South-western Slopes Bioregion and update of NSW Western Plains plant communities. Version 2 of the NSWVCA database. Cunninghamia 10(4): 599-673.
• Benson, J.S., Richards, P., Waller, S. & Allen, C. (2010) New South Wales Vegetation Classification and Assessment: Part 3 Plant communities in the NSW North Western Slopes and west-New England region and update of Western Plains and NSW South Western Slopes Bioregion. Version 3 of the NSWVCA database. Cunninghamia 11(4): 457-579. 
• Grossman, D. H., Faber-Langendoen, D., Weakley, A.S., Anderson, M., Bourgeron, P., Crawford, R. , Goodin, K., Landaal, G., Metzler, K., Patterson, K.D., Pyne, M., Reid, M. & Sneddon, L. (1998) International classification of ecological communities: terrestrial vegetation of the United States. Volume I. The National Vegetation Classification System: development, status, and applications (The Nature Conservancy: Arlington,Virginia, USA).
• Jennings, M.D., Faber-Langendoen, D., Peet, R.K., Loucks, O.L., Glenn-Lewin, C., Damman, A., Barbour, M.G., Pfister, R., Grossman, D.H., Roberts, D., Tart, D., Walker, M., Talbot, S.S., Walker, J., Hartshorn, G.S., Waggoner, G., Abrams, M.D., Hill, A. & Rejmanek, M. (2006) Description, documentation and evaluation of associations and alliances within the U.S. National Vegetation Classification. Version 4.5 (Ecological Society of America: Washington).
• Keith, D.A. (2004) From ocean shores to desert dunes: the vegetation of New South Wales and the ACT (Department of Environment and Conservation NSW: Hurstville).
• Jon Paul Rodríguez, Kathryn M. Rodríguez-Clark, Jonathan E. M. Baillie, Neville Ash, John Benson, Tim Boucher, Claire Brown, Neil Burgess, Ben Collen, Michael Jennings, David A. Keith, Emily Nicholson, Carmen Revenga, Mathieu Rouget, Tammy Smith, Mark Spalding, Belinda Reyers, Andrew Taber, Matt Walpole, Irene Zager and Tara Zamin (2011) Towards Red List Criteria for Threatened Ecosystems. Conservation Biology 25(1): 21-29.

The rare ID113 Ooline (Cadellia pentastylis) forest on gravelly sandstone on Mosquito Creek Road west of Warialda. Photograph, Jaime Plaza.

The NSWVCA is completed for the NSW Western Plains and the NSW Western Slopes Sections with the west-New England Tableland also covered. Work is continuing on the NSW Tablelands - click on map to view enlargement.

 NSWVCA Progress of NSW

NSWVCA Flow Diagram

>> Download Benson (2006)Cunninghamia 9(3): 331-382:

• Foreword
• pp. 331-381 (6.6 MB)

>> Download Benson et al. (2006)Cunninghamia 9(3): 383-451:

• pp. 383-450 (8.7 MB)
• Erratum (25 KB)
• Updated Table 5 (33KB)

>> Download Benson (2008) Cunninghamia 10(4):

• pp. 599-672 (8 MB)

>> Download  Benson et al. (2010) Cunninghamia 11(4): 457-579:

• pp. 457-579 (16.6 MB)

>> View example of Short Report (ID20 Sandhill Buloke Riverina)

>> View example of Full Report (ID156 Bladder Saltbush stony ranges)

>> View changes to NSWVCA from June 2006 onwards

>> View NSWVCA Threat Criteria

>> View DNSWVCA Database Description

>> View Poster on 'Prioritising biodiversity conservation action' 

 
Botanic Gardens Trust Senior Ecologist John Benson and Botanic Gardens Trust Photographer Jaime Plaza inspecting vegetation types with a property owner near Narran Lake in north-western NSW. Photo: Sally Waller.