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Kidman Springs Long Term Exclosure Study - Vegetation Changes 1973-2002

The data are herbage biomass (dry weight, gram per square metre) and density of trees and shrubs (number per transect) measured inside cattle-proof exclosures and on adjacent grazed areas on two sites of different soils at Kidman Springs, Northern Territory between 1973 and 2002.

Simple

Identification info

Date (Creation)
1973-04-11
Date (Publication)
2024-12-04
Date (Revision)
2025-12-11
Edition
1

Publisher

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
+61 7 3365 9097

Author

CSIRO Environment - Liedloff, Adam ()
Clunies Ross Street, Black Mountain, 2601, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
Black Mountain
Australian Capital Territory
2601
Australia

Author

Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, Northern Territory Government - Cowley, Robyn (Senior Rangeland Scientist - NT Department of Industry)
33 Vaughan Street, Berrimah, 0828, Northern Territory, Australia
Berrimah
Northern Territory
0828
Australia

Co-author

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation - Bastin, Gary ()
147 Underwood Avenue, Floreat, 6014, Western Australia, Australia
Floreat
Western Australia
6014
Australia

Co-author

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation - Ludwig, John ()
147 Underwood Avenue, Floreat, 6014, Western Australia, Australia
Floreat
Western Australia
6014
Australia

Custodian

CSIRO Environment
Clunies Ross Street, Black Mountain, 2601, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
Black Mountain
Australian Capital Territory
2601
Australia

Custodian

Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, Northern Territory Government
33 Vaughan Street, Berrimah, 0828, Northern Territory, Australia
Berrimah
Northern Territory
0828
Australia

Funder

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation
147 Underwood Avenue, Floreat, 6014, Western Australia, Australia
Floreat
Western Australia
6014
Australia

Funder

Northern Territory Government
22 Mitchell Street, Darwin, Northern Territory, 0800, Australia
Darwin
Northern Territory
0800
Australia
Website
https://www.tern.org.au/

Purpose
Initially, in the 1970s and 1980s, to test the effectiveness of destocking, using exclosures, as a means of promoting pasture recovery on two important rangeland types of the semi-arid tropics of north west Australia. Subsequently, to determine the longer-term (30+ years) dynamics of these red-soil and black-soil vegetation communities.
Credit
We at TERN acknowledge the Traditional Owners and Custodians throughout Australia, New Zealand and all nations. We honour their profound connections to land, water, biodiversity and culture and pay our respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.
Status
Completed

Point of contact

CSIRO Environment - Liedloff, Adam ()
Clunies Ross Street, Black Mountain, 2601, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
Clunies Ross Street
Black Mountain
Australian Capital Territory
2601
Australia
Topic category
  • Environment

Extent

Description
Victoria River Research Station, Kidman Springs, Northern Territory.
N
S
E
W


Temporal extent

Time period
1973-04-11 2002-06-30
Maintenance and update frequency
Not planned
GCMD Science Keywords
  • RECLAMATION/REVEGETATION/RESTORATION
  • GRAZING DYNAMICS / PLANT ECOLOGY
  • RANGELAND
ANZSRC Fields of Research
  • Terrestrial ecology
  • Conservation and biodiversity
TERN Platform Vocabulary
  • Kidman Springs Red & Black Soil Exclosures
TERN Parameter Vocabulary
  • tree count
  • Number
  • shrub count
  • Number
  • grazing present
  • Unitless
  • erosion present
  • Unitless
  • above-ground herbage biomass
  • Gram per Square Metre
QUDT Units of Measure
  • Number
  • Number
  • Unitless
  • Unitless
  • Gram per Square Metre
GCMD Horizontal Resolution Ranges
  • 30 meters - < 100 meters
GCMD Temporal Resolution Ranges
  • irregular
Australian Plant Name Index
  • Brachyachne convergens (F.Muell.) Stapf
  • Enneapogon polyphyllus (Domin) N.T.Burb.
  • Heteropogon contortus (L.) P.Beauv. ex Roem. & Schult.
  • Dichanthium P.Willemet
  • Iseilema Andersson
  • Chrysopogon fallax S.T.Blake
  • Acacia bidwillii Benth.
  • Acacia sp.
  • Atalaya hemiglauca (F.Muell.) F.Muell. ex Benth.
  • Cochlospermum fraseri Planch.
  • Ehretia saligna R.Br.
  • Eucalyptus confertiflora Kippist
  • Eucalyptus pruinosa Schauer
  • Eucalyptus microtheca F.Muell.
  • Eucalyptus terminalis F.Muell.
  • Eucalyptus sp.
  • Gyrocarpus americanus Jacq.
  • Hakea arborescens R.Br.
  • Lysiphyllum cunninghamii (Benth.) de Wit
  • Premna acuminata R.Br.
  • Terminalia arostrata Ewart & O.B.Davies
  • Terminalia volucris R.Br. ex Benth.
  • Ventilago viminalis Hook.
  • Acacia colei Maslin & L.A.J.Thomson
  • Acacia farnesiana (L.) Willd.
  • Calotropis procera (Aiton) R.Br. ex W.T.Aiton
  • Carissa lanceolata R.Br.
  • Senna oligoclada (F.Muell.) Randell
  • Grewia retusifolia Kurz

Resource constraints

Use limitation
The Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license allows others to copy, distribute, display, and create derivative works provided that they credit the original source and any other nominated parties. Details are provided at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
File name
88x31.png
File description
CCBy Logo from creativecommons.org
File type
png
Linkage
https://w3id.org/tern/static/cc-by/88x31.png

Title
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence
Alternate title
CC-BY
Edition
4.0
Website
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Access constraints
License
Use constraints
Other restrictions
Other constraints
TERN services are provided on an "as-is" and "as available" basis. Users use any TERN services at their discretion and risk. They will be solely responsible for any damage or loss whatsoever that results from such use including use of any data obtained through TERN and any analysis performed using the TERN infrastructure. <br />Web links to and from external, third party websites should not be construed as implying any relationships with and/or endorsement of the external site or its content by TERN. <br /><br />Please advise any work or publications that use this data via the online form at https://www.tern.org.au/research-publications/#reporting
Other constraints
Please cite this dataset as {Author} ({PublicationYear}). {Title}. {Version, as appropriate}. Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network. Dataset. {Identifier}.

Resource constraints

Classification
Unclassified

Distribution Information

Distribution format
  • NetCDF

Distributor

Distributor

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
OnLine resource
Herbage Biomass Data at Kidman Springs Transects

Distribution Information

Distribution format
  • NetCDF

Distributor

Distributor

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
OnLine resource
Tree & Shrub Density (#/Transect) at Kidman Springs Transects

Distribution Information

Distribution format
  • NetCDF

Distributor

Distributor

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
OnLine resource
Data dictionary for Kidman Springs Data

Distribution Information

Distribution format
  • NetCDF

Distributor

Distributor

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
OnLine resource
GPS Locations of Kidman Springs Transects

Distribution Information

Distribution format
  • NetCDF

Distributor

Distributor

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
OnLine resource
Map of Kidman Springs Exclosures Shown on Google Earth Image

Distribution Information

Distribution format
  • NetCDF

Distributor

Distributor

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
OnLine resource
Map of Transect Locations: Black Soil Site

Distribution Information

Distribution format
  • NetCDF

Distributor

Distributor

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
OnLine resource
Map of Transect Locations: Red Soil, Eroded Site

Distribution Information

Distribution format
  • NetCDF

Distributor

Distributor

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
OnLine resource
Map of Transect Locations: Red Soil, Not Eroded Site

Distribution Information

Distribution format

Distributor

Distributor

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd, Indooroopilly, QLD, Australia, 4068
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
OnLine resource
ro-crate-metadata.json

Resource lineage

Statement
The use of destocking as a means of promoting pasture recovery was evaluated on two important rangeland types of the semi-arid tropics of north west Australia.<br><br> Fenced areas approximately 500-m square were established in 1973 on Victoria River Research Station, Kidman Springs, Northern Territory. One site, called Black Soil, was located on a cracking clay soil with shrubs (mainly <em>Carissa lanceolate</em>, conkerberry) and trees (<em>Lysiphyllum cunninghamii</em>, bauhinia and <em>Terminalia volucris</em>, rosewood) on the margins. The herbage layer was dominated by <em>Chrysopogon fallax</em> (ribbon grass) and <em>Iseilema fragile</em> (Flinders grass). This site was minimally affected by past grazing and was deemed in good condition. Two exclosures were constructed on red calcareous soils; one site eroded (Red Soil, eroded) and the other not (Red Soil, not eroded). When data collection commenced, the red-soil sites had an open tree and shrub layer of <em>Eucalyptus pruinose</em> (silver leaf gum), <em>E. terminalis</em> (bloodwood) and <em>C. lanceolata</em>. The herbage layer at the good site was dominated by biennial <em>Enneapogon spp.</em> (limestone grass) with sparse <em>Brachyachne convergens</em> (native couch), <em>Sporobolus australasicus</em> (fairy grass) and <em>Aristida spp.</em> (wire grasses) present in the degraded state.<br><br> Six permanent plots (45&nbsp;m by&nbsp;30 m) were randomly located inside and outside of each of the three exclosures.<br><br> Herbage biomass was measured by clipping individual species. Species were harvested within five randomly placed 1-m square quadrats at each plot. Samples were oven dried to obtain dry weight. Additional biomass data were obtained in two years (1989 and 1994) by estimating yield and composition using BOTANAL (Tothill et al. 1992) within 15 randomly placed 1-m square quadrats at each of the six permanently marked sampling locations.<br><br> Trees and shrubs, categorised by lifeform (juvenile or mature), were counted within fixed 0.14-ha areas at each of the permanent sampling locations used to collect herbage biomass data. These numbers were multiplied by 7.14 to give the number per hectare (i.e. density).<br><br> For analysis, the dry-weight biomass of individual species was sequentially grouped into functional groups: annual or perennial grasses and forbs, total grass and forb, and total herbage biomass. The data are provided by functional group and the biomass of dominant species for each soil type. Similarly, the densities of tree and shrub species by lifeform were aggregated to juvenile trees or shrubs and mature trees or shrubs and, from there, total trees or total shrubs. Data are provided by species with the user to aggregate to lifeform and age groups if required.<br><br> Two separate analyses were conducted based on time since exclosure. In the first (Foran et al. 1985), analysis of variance was conducted on the herbage biomass and woody density data to examine the effect of destocking and year (essentially, prior wet-season rainfall). Stepwise multiple linear regression analysis was used to define the influence of different factors such as rainfall, stocking rate and shrub density on the levels of standing biomass in the grazed treatments. For the red-soil sites in their second reporting period (Bastin et al. 2003), repeated-measures analysis of variance was used to explore whether there was a significant change (slope) across time (years since exclosure) and, if so, whether changes across time differed for inside and outside the exclosures (treatments). If changes across time appeared to be non-linear, quadratic and cubic polynomials were explored.
Hierarchy level
Dataset
Title
Foran, B., Bastin, G., & Hill, B. (1985). The pasture dynamics and management of two rangeland communities in the Victoria River District of the Northern Territory. The Rangeland Journal, 7(2), 107.
Website
https://doi.org/10.1071/RJ9850107

Method documentation

Title
Bastin, G. N., Ludwig, J. A., Eager, R. W., Liedloff, A. C., Andison, R. T., & Cobiac, M. D. (2003). Vegetation changes in a semiarid tropical savanna, northern Australia: 1973–2002. Rangeland Journal, 25(1), 3–19.
Website
https://doi.org/10.1071/RJ03001

Method documentation

Title
Tothill, J.C.; Hargreaves, J.N.G.; Jones, R.M.; McDonals, C.K. (1992). BOTANAL - A Comprehensive Sampling and Computing Procedure for Estimating Pasture Yield and Composition. 1. Field Sampling . St Lucia, Qld.: CSIRO Division of Tropical Crops and Pastures; 1992.
Website
https://doi.org/10.4225/08/58712e506e989

Method documentation

Reference System Information

Reference system identifier
EPSG/EPSG:4326

Reference system type
Geodetic Geographic 2D

Metadata

Metadata identifier
urn:uuid/d8a667e6-e5da-4a0b-9bd2-f44acacae3a8

Title
TERN GeoNetwork UUID

Language
English
Character encoding
UTF8

Point of contact

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
+61 7 3365 9097

Type of resource

Resource scope
Dataset
Metadata linkage
https://geonetwork.tern.org.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/d8a667e6-e5da-4a0b-9bd2-f44acacae3a8

Point-of-truth metadata URL

Date info (Creation)
2024-07-19T00:00:00.000000+00:00
Date info (Revision)
2025-12-11T22:51:02.511421+00:00

Metadata standard

Title
ISO 19115-1:2014/AMD 1:2018 Geographic information - Metadata - Fundamentals
Edition
1

Metadata standard

Title
ISO/TS 19115-3:2016
Edition
1.0

Metadata standard

Title
ISO/TS 19157-2:2016
Edition
1.0
Title
Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network (TERN) Metadata Profile of ISO 19115-3:2016 and ISO 19157-2:2016
Date (published)
2021
Edition
1.0

Identifier

Code
10.5281/zenodo.5652221
Website
https://github.com/ternaustralia/TERN-ISO19115/releases/tag/v1.0

 
 

Overviews

Spatial extent

N
S
E
W


Keywords

ANZSRC Fields of Research
Conservation and biodiversity Terrestrial ecology
GCMD Science Keywords
GRAZING DYNAMICS / PLANT ECOLOGY RANGELAND RECLAMATION/REVEGETATION/RESTORATION

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