TERN's Australian Transect Network Director Stefan Caddy-Retalic's presentation on TERN infrastructure at EcoTas13 in November 2013.

1. TERN Infrastructure
Building new ecological plot infrastructure to
enable Australian science
Stefan Caddy-Retalic
Director, Australian Transect Network
stefan.caddy-retalic@adelaide.edu.au

2. Rationale: What is TERN?
• A network to provide infrastructure to enable
Australian environmental science
(i.e. not research, though some capacity for demonstration projects)
• Building hard and soft infrastructure powerful
enough to help answer big ecological questions
• Improving networks across ecosystem science
community (écologistes sans frontières)
• Data and products to be made freely available
• Empowering researchers and environmental
managers
• A service to be utilised

3. TERN Plot Networks
• AusPlots
– Forests
– Rangelands
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Australian Transect Network
Australian Super Site Network
Long Term Ecological Plot Network (LTERN)
Lots of other TERN facilities that are not plotbased (e.g. OzFlux, AusCover, Eco-Informatics,
eMast, Coasts etc)

4. AusPlots Rangelands
• Rangelands
81% of Australia, least studied regions, >decadal cycles
• AusPlots designed to form a network of reference
sites to be used as baseline data and for
monitoring/trajectory projection and
management.
• Most sites “best on offer”
• Include some of the most remote regions in
Australia – therefore difficult (and expensive) for
many researchers to access.

5. Australian Transect Network
Developing transects that are:
• Subcontinental scale
• Cross multiple IBRA bioregions
• Traverse environmental gradients (e.g.
temperature, rainfall, land use)
• Complement other TERN facilities (AusPlots,
LTERN, Super Sites, AusCover)
• Uses AusPlots Rangelands & other methodologies

6. AusPlots & ATN Sites
• 1 ha (100mx100m)
• 1010 point intercepts (substrate, multi strata veg)
• Plant vouchers for each species
Herbarium ID plus additional tissue for genetic and isotopic analysis (extra material for dominant spp)
• 1x 1m+ soil characterisation
Colour, texture, EC, pH, lithology etc
• 9x 30cm soil characterisation
Including soil crust for metabarcoding analysis
• Basal area
• Tri-photo point panoramas (Ben’s talk)
• Leaf Area Index

7. Status to date
AusPlots Forests
AusPlots Rangelands
SWATT Transect
TREND Transect
332 sites surveyed
with APR method
16 sites surveyed
with APF method

8. Status to date
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Methodology published
Training workshops held in SA & WA
Field collection app developed
Pipeline between field collection and data repository established
Data publishing pathways operational
Data published for ~100 sites in ÆKOS
Data published in Soils 2 Satellites
~10,000 plant specimens ID’d by regional herbaria
~4 tonnes of soil deposited in National Soil Archive
Genetic and isotopic samples available to research community

9. Using Data: Soils 2 Satellites
www.soils2satellites.org.au
• Targeted at general users
(including scientists browsing)
• Demonstration data
visualisation tool w/ ALA
& TERN Eco-Informatics
• Users can get a sense of
site attributes including:
Landform, soils, veg composition
and structure, soil metabarcoding
• Currently ~30 sites
available (intend to upload many more).

10. Using Data: ÆKOS
www.aekos.org.au
• Targeted at scientists and
modellers
• Data fully described
• All data available for
download
• Suitable for new or
combined analysis
• Currently ~100 AusPlots/
ATN sites available in data portal
• Data for ~100,000 other plots nationally

11. Using Samples
• 332 sites of:
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Pressed herbarium specimens (ID, morphology etc)
Dried leaf vouchers (DNA, isotopes, chemical analysis)
Soil samples (chemical and physical characterisation)
Surface crusts (DNA, soil microbiology, metabarcoding)
• Samples are available to researchers
– Projects likely to yield results of maximal utility to the
research and management community will be prioritised
– Subject to “share alike” principle

12. Take Home Messages
• TERN is charged with developing scientific
infrastructure to enable the Australian (and global)
ecosystem science community
• All TERN products will be made (or are already)
freely available
Data, software code, sample collections, etc
• We want to work with you
• New partnerships are welcome
• Help us get better at serving you

13. Questions?
stefan.caddy-retalic@adelaide.edu.au
UAdel: (+61) 8 8313 1257