West End Plant Communities

Feral animal control efforts in the 1990's focused on the west end of the island due to the natural separation provided by the isthmus. In 1990, consultants from the Santa Cruz Island Reserve and Santa Barbara Botanic Garden established a monitoring protocol designed to track the vegetation recovery.

For more information, please see:
Laughrin et al. 1994. Trends in vegetation changes with removal of feral animal grazing pressures on Santa Catalina Island. In: W.L. Halvorson and G.L. Maender, Eds. The Fourth California Islands Symposium: Update on the Status of Resources. Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, Santa Barbara, California, pp. 523-530.

Management Goal:
To increase the health, as measured by cover, species richness, and ratio of native to non-native species, of Santa Catalina Island's plant communities. Towards this goal, to determine the effect of removing non-native herbivores on the vegetation. Goats, bison, and pigs have been removed on the west end, with only deer remaining.

Monitoring Methods:
Cover and composition data are obtained from quadrats placed along 17 transects distributed among six different vegetation types (ironwood groves, scrub oak woodland, chaparral, coastal sage scrub, maritime cactus scrub, and grassland).

Collection Frequency:
Monitoring was begun by consultants in 1990, and continued until 1992. Data was collected again in collaboration with Conservancy staff in 2000. In the future, data will be collected every third year (i.e. 2003, 2006…).