The project systematically surveys the extent and condition of remnant native vegetation on railway corridors / roadsides . A standard drive-by survey methodology is used to record dominant species (overstorey, understorey, emergent, threatened and alien species), structural type, density/distribution and understorey vegetation type in roadside vegetation. Mapping outputs are used to inform roadside vegetation management by Local and State Governments.

TREND will provide the ecological infrastructure that will: quantify the richness and cover of plant species (including weeds); quantify the diversity and abundance of soil biodiversity; assess the state, spatial heterogeneity and structural complexity of vegetation, including life-stage; record vegetation and soil parameters that assist with the validation of remotely sensed ecological products; analyse vegetation structure and change based on a series of photo reference images; better estimate soil carbon and nutrient stocks; conduct taxonomic validation studies based on collected plant voucher specimens; conduct DNA barcoding and population genetic profiling based on collected tissue samples. The collation of these data will: increase understanding of the dynamics of plant species and soils; substantially increase knowledge of the carbon and other important nutrient budgets across an environmental gradient; improve quality of remote sensing products; input into DNA barcoding of Australian vegetation; help understand the biogeography underpinning and threatening processes impacting South Australian ecosystems; assist state and federal agencies to meet their monitoring and reporting obligations; create a photographic reference of South Australia&#39s bioregions to enhance existing state photo reference libraries; enable researchers and land managers to assess current land state for a variety of purposes depending on how the data is used; identify the climate zones, bioregions, land types and ecosystems where changes are occurring and the management regimes and/or pressures contributing to these changes. Overall this information will progress understanding of ecosystem processes, structure and function, and more generally progress understanding of the response to disturbance and longer term environmental change of rangeland ecosystems, which underpins sustainable management practice. Under the Biome of Australia Soil Environments (BASE) project, soil samples are collected at 14 TREND sites for subsequent physical/chemical and metabarcoding analysis. Under the Biome of Australia Soil Environments (BASE; https://ccgapps.com.au/bpa-metadata/base/) project, soil samples are collected at 14 TREND sites for subsequent physical/chemical and metabarcoding analysis.

The SWATT is an initiative developed collaboratively by TERN's Australian Transect Network and the Department of Parks and Wildlife, Western Australia (DPaW). The SWATT is one of four national ecological transects or plot networks that traverse key Australian terrestrial ecosystems. The principal purpose of the transects is to measure selected biodiversity attributes along with biophysical processes, that will inform key ecosystem science questions and assist with the development and validation of ecosystem models. Transects will enable benchmarking and subsequent monitoring of trends in ecological condition in response to continental scale biophysical processes such as climate change. The SWATT is located in the south west of Western Australian extending for over 1,200km from Walpole on the south coast to just beyond the former pastoral lease of Lorna Glen and into the Little Sandy Desert. The SWATT incorporates the internationally recognised biodiversity hotspot that is the Southwest Botanical Province (Myers et al. 2000, Hopper P & Gioia 2004), a national biodiversity hotspot (Central and Eastern Avon Wheatbelt) and the evolutionary significant species rich Southwest Interzone (Hopper 1979, Gibson et al. 2010) which includes the globally significant Great Western Woodlands (GWW) (Watson et al. 2009). The SWATT also intercepts another two national significant phytogeographic transitional zone, the Triodia-Acacia line (Beard 1975) and the Menzies line (Butt et al. 1977).