Shallow Lake Limnology Monitoring Protocol: Central Alaska Network (CAKN) and Arctic Network (ARCN) Version 2.0
Dates
Year
2011
Citation
Larsen, Amy, Houghton, Jon, Black, Jenelle, Verbyla, Dave, Rudebusch, Cory, McGinnis, Roger, and Kristenson, Heidi, 2011, Shallow Lake Limnology Monitoring Protocol: Central Alaska Network (CAKN) and Arctic Network (ARCN) Version 2.0: National Park Service: Fort Collins, Colorado, v. NPS/AKRO/NRR—2011/347, 656 Pages.
Summary
The Central Alaska Network (CAKN) and the Arctic Network (ARCN) are part of the National Park Service (NPS) Inventory and Monitoring (I&M) Program. CAKN is composed of three national park units: Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Denali National Park and Preserve, and Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve. ARCN is composed of Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, Noatak National Preserve, Kobuk Valley National Park, Cape Krusenstern National Monument and Bering Land Bridge National Preserve. The Inventory and Monitoring Program is the result of the National Parks Omnibus Management Act, which was passed by Congress in 1998. This Act directs the National Park Service to ?establish baseline [resource] information [...]
Summary
The Central Alaska Network (CAKN) and the Arctic Network (ARCN) are part of the National Park Service (NPS) Inventory and Monitoring (I&M) Program. CAKN is composed of three national park units: Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Denali National Park and Preserve, and Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve. ARCN is composed of Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, Noatak National Preserve, Kobuk Valley National Park, Cape Krusenstern National Monument and Bering Land Bridge National Preserve. The Inventory and Monitoring Program is the result of the National Parks Omnibus Management Act, which was passed by Congress in 1998. This Act directs the National Park Service to ?establish baseline [resource] information and to provide information on the long-term trends in the condition of National Park System resources.? To accomplish this formidable task,the NPS has grouped parks into 32 networks based upon ecological similarities. Four of these networks are in Alaska. The lands encompassed by CAKN and ARCN are vast: the eight park units within these two networks contain over 16.5 million hectares (40.8 million acres) and span an area that is 1200 km from east to west and 1000 km from north to south. Based on area, the two networks represent 50% of all the land in the National Park Service system. Yet despite this immense coverage,these eight park units contain natural resources — both physical and biological — that are similar in many respects. Perhaps the most significant shared feature is the integrity of their ecological systems. These Parks and Preserves provide the space and the time to see and understand natural processes that are occurring at great spatial and temporal scales. The primary goal of the I&M program is to build a holistic database that will allow detection of change across the ecosystems of the networks — specifically, to detect change in the ecological components of the Network parks, and in the relationships among those components.The Networks have developed and prioritized a suite of ?vital signs? for long-term monitoring.Park vital signs are selected physical, chemical, and biological elements and processes of park ecosystems that represent the overall health or condition of the park.
