Ecological Systems Codes

A terrestrial ecological system is defined as a group of plant community types that tend to co-occur within landscapes with similar ecological processes, substrates, and/or environmental gradients. A given terrestrial ecological system will typically manifest itself in a landscape at intermediate geographic scales of 10s to 1,000s of hectares and persist for 50 or more years. Ecological processes include natural disturbances such as fire and flooding. Substrates may include a variety of soil surface and bedrock features, such as shallow soils, alkaline parent materials, sandy/gravelling soils, or peatlands. Finally, environmental gradients include local climates, hydrologically defined patterns in coastal zones, arid grassland or desert areas, or montane, alpine or subalpine zones.

To download the below list of ecological systems as a zipped Microsoft Excel file, click here. For detailed descriptions of the ecological systems, please see our final reports or use NatureServe's Ecological System Explorer tool.