A DATA SET is a series of observations collected by the same methodology. Each data set should have documentation sufficient for someone unfamiliar with the research to replicate the study. Data sets may be broken into subsets (data files) that are discrete in space and time, in that order. The documentation for a data set should include all spatial and temporal subdivisions of the data.

(Data, Abstract, Methods, Variables)

NOTES:

• Add rows to tables or lines to paragraphs as you need them for entering your data.
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PERSON(S) COMPLETING THIS FORM: E-MAIL ADDRESS:

DATA SET IDENTIFIER: Revegetation of landslides, vegetation > 1.0m (Large landslide plots at the Luquillo Experimental Forest)

PROJECT TITLE: Landslide Revegetation

PROJECT DESCRIPTION: Landslide are among the most severe rainforest disturbances (Garwood et al. 1979, Hubbell & Foster 1986, Sousa 1984, Waide & Lugo 1992, Walker et al. in press), generating extreme abiotic spatial gradients (Fernández & Myster 1995) and exposing soil and parent material (Guariguata 1990). Landslides contain patches of vegetation surrounded by a matrix of soil or bare substrate (Dalling 1994, Myster & Fernández 1995). In addition, they often undergo recurrent localized disturbance either by resliding or by treefall at the edge of the landslide (Hartshorn 1980), thereby adding new plant preopagules, soil or organic material after the initial slippage. These landslide feature, coupled with interactions between patches of similar soil or vetetation (including seed dispersal, shading, litter deposition and vegetative reproduction), strongly suggets that landslide are a patch-dynamic system (Hupp 1983, Pickett & White 1985).

Changes in the composition and abundance of species within these patches over space and time can be considered successional pathways (Austin 1977, Myster & Pickett 1990). Analysis of the pathways can indicate (i) spatial and temporal variation in initial species richness and rate of species turnover (Myster & Pickett 1994), (ii) important species that define pathways and may suggest key regeneration strategies, (iii) community convergence or divergence, and (iv) the effects of past history and land-use (Myster &Pickett 1990, 1994).

Here we use permanent plot data sampled from 16 landslide to documents temporal successional pathways in landslide patches (without the use of a chronosequence, cf. Guariguata 1990) and address the following questions: (1) What are the successional pathways of landslide and what species define them? How much pathway variation of individual plots is there within these landslides? (2) How similar are pathways among landslide? Is there any evidence that, with time, landslides either converge to a common vegetative enpoint or slow in the rate of successional change?

LTER CORE AREAS: (Annotate all that apply)

Disturbance Patterns

Primary Productivity

LEF LTER 1 RESEARCH TOPIC: (Annotate all that apply)

Gap Revegetation

We define a data file as a component of a data set. A data set can have only one data file or more. Basically, different data files have different data structures or format.
DATA SET FILES (SUBSETS):

Data File No.	Data File Identifier	On-Line Filename	Starting Date	Periodicity of sample	End Period
1	Espiritu Santo Landslide 1 Intensive measurements	(1) ES-1	June 3, 1988	approximately every 6 months	December 18, 2007
2	Espiritu Santo Landslide 2 Intensive measurements	(2) ES-2	January 22, 1990	approximately every 6 months	July 7, 2007
3	Rio Blanco Landslide 2 Intensive measurements	(3) RB-2	January 1, 1989	approximately every 6 months	July 7, 1997; August 6, 2006
4	Espiritu Santo Landslide 4 Intensive measurements	(4) ES-4	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	June 26, 1999
5	Espiritu Santo Landslide 5 Intensive measurements	(5) ES-5	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	July 10, 1997
6	Espiritu Santo Landslide 6 Intensive measurements	(6) ES-6	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	June 26, 1999
7	Espiritu Santo Landslide 7 Intensive measurements	(7) ES-7	January 19, 1989	once	January 19, 1989
8	Espiritu Santo Landslide 8 Intensive measurements	(8) ES-8	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	June 28, 1999
9	Espiritu Santo Landslide 9 Intensive measurements	(9) ES-9	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	June 28, 1999
10	Espiritu Santo Landslide 10 Intensive measurements	(10) ES-10	May 17, 1989	approximately every 6 months	June 26, 1999
11	Espiritu Santo Landslide 11 Intensive measurements	(11) ES-11	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	July 28, 1999
12	Jimenez Landslide 1 Intensive measurements	(12) J-1	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	June 26, 1999
13	Jimenez Landslide 2 Intensive measurements	(13) J-2	April 2, 1990	approximately every 6 months	June 26, 1999
14	Mameyes Landslide 2 Intensive measurements	(14) MY-2	April 2, 1990	approximately every 6 months	June 26, 1999
15	Rio Blanco Landslide 2 Intensive measurements	(15) RB-2	January 1, 1989	approximately every 6 months	April 12, 1991
16	Rio Blanco Landslide 3 Intensive measurements	(16) RB-3	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	April 12, 1991
17	Rio Blanco Landslide 4 Intensive measurements	(17) RB-4	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	June 26 , 1999
18	Rio Blanco Landslide 5 Intensive measurements	(18) RB-5	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	June 26 , 1999
19	Rio Blanco Landslide 6 Intensive measurements	(19) RB-6	January 19, 1989	approximately every 6 months	June 26 , 1999
20	Rio Blanco Landslide 9 Intensive measurements	(20) RB-9	April 2, 1990	approximately every 6 months	June 26 , 1999

RESEARCH LOCATION: Several landslides along roadsides and in undisturbed forested slopes in the Luquillo Experimental Forest (LEF). These database includes the data from 20 landslides in the following watersheds: ES=Espiritu Santo, My=Mameyes, J=Jimenez, and RB=Rio Blanco.

INVESTIGATORS:

PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATORS E-MAIL address

Lawrence Walker	walker@lternet.edu
Jean Lodge	DJLodge@coqui.net

OTHER RESEARCHERS E-MAIL address

Randall Myster	RMyster@ucok.edu
Fred Landau

CONTACT PERSONS E-MAIL address Phone Number (Include area code)

Lawrence Walker

walker@lternet.edu

(702)895-3196

SOURCE OF FUNDING (SPONSOR): NSF-LTER

DATA SET ABSTRACT: The purpose of this study is to document the recovery of vegetation on new landslides in the Luquillo Experimental Forest.

DATA SET METHODS: All woody vegetation greater than 1 m tall are tagged and surveyed approximately every 6 months (4 months in the first year).

REFERENCES:

SAMPLE LOCATION: N/A

CROSS-REFERENCES (other data sets related to this one): LTERDBAS#7: Soil Characteristics of Landslide; LTERDBAS#15: Revegetation of landslides, vegetation 0.1m (Small landslide plots at the Luquillo Experimental Forest); LTERDBAS#18: Revegetation of landslides, vegetation > 1.0m (Large landslide plots at the Luquillo Experimental Forest); LTERDBAS#36: Landslide Revegetation Canopy Measurements & Cover Estimates; LTERDBAS#52: Above ground biomass in landslides; LTERDBAS#154: Soil factors predict initial plant colonization on Puerto Rican landslides; Project Species List.

STORAGE SITES: ITES, Data Manager's File DM-001 , Drawer #1

INVESTIGATOR'S ASSIGNED KEYWORDS: landslide, succession, LTER, revegetation, Cecropia, Phytolacca

LEF LTER OFFICIAL KEYWORDS (See table): LANDSLIDE PLOTS, DISTURBANCE, PRIMARY PRODUCTION, SUCCESSION, TREES, PEER REVIEWED JOURNAL

PUBLICATIONS:
Myster, R.W. and L.R. Walker. 1997. Plant successional pathways on Puerto Rican landslides. Journal of Tropical Ecology 13:165-173.

Walker, L.R. and L.E. Neris*. 1993. Posthurricane seed rain dynamics in Puerto Rico. Biotropica 25:408-418.

Walker, L.R., (1)D.J. Zarin, N. Fetcher, (1)R.W. Myster, and (1)A.H. Johnson. 1996. Ecosystem development and plant succession on landslides in the Caribbean. Biotropica 28:566-576.

DISSEMINATION: UNRESTRICTED

REASONS TO RESTRICT DATA IN THIS DATA SET BEYOND ITS TWO YEAR POLICY PERIOD*:

*WILL HAVE TO BE APPROVED BY LTER PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATORS: N. BROKAW, A. LUGO

FILING
___ "File" copy only : Data Management will only file an electronic copy of the data file and its documentation
X "Enter" data on-line : Data Management will be in charge of entering the data on computer files (Contact Eda C. Meléndez)

SITES DESCRIPTIONS:
Each of the extensive and intensive landslides has plots 2 X 5 m distributed along transect lines at 10 m intervals from the upper lip of the slide. The intensive slides (ES-1, ES-2, and RB-2 [until 1989], have a 2 X 1 m seedling subplot along the lower edge of the plot)

Geographical positional system (GPS) Coordinates for each location:

location	latitude	longitude

VARIABLES (ATTRIBUTES):

FILE NAME OR #ABOVE (all in which the variable appears)	1-19	1-19	1-19 (until 1995); 1,2 (after 1995)	1-19 (until 1995); 1,2 (after 1995)
ABBREVIATION (as it appears on the data file)	Transect	Plot	Tag number	Height
NAME OF VARIABLE	Transect	Plot	Tag Number	Height
DEFINITION OF VARIABLE	Lines at 10 m intervals from the upper lip of the slide	2 X 5 m areas distributed along transect lines	Tag identifying plant (since 1995, only in ES1 & ES2)	Height of woody vegetation greater than 1 m tall
UNIT				meter
PRECISION
RANGE OR LIST OF VALUES	1-6	1-40	1...	1...
DATA TYPE	numeric	numeric	integer	decimal
MISSING DATA CODES

VARIABLES (ATTRIBUTES):

FILE NAME OR #ABOVE (all in which the variable appears)	1-19 (until 1995); 1,2 (after 1995)	1-19 (Since 1995 only 1 and 2)	3-19	3-19
ABBREVIATION (as it appears on the data file)	Diameter	Speciecode	Number	Fern species
NAME OF VARIABLE	Diameter	Specie code	Number	Species Code of Ferns
DEFINITION OF VARIABLE	Basal diameter measured with colipers (since 1995 only 1,2)	Six letter code: first 3 letters of the genus and first 3 letters of the species. (used by other projects as well). (Format used is GggSss, here Ggg = first three letters of the genus, and Sss = first 3 letters of the species )	Count of individual plants of only three climbing ferns {GleBif, DicPec, OdoAcu} (incorporated since 1995) including any tree fern of any woody species)	Six letter code of only three climbing ferns (GleBif, DicPec, OdoAcu): first 3 letters of the genus and first 3 letters of the fern species.
UNIT	centimeter		number
PRECISION	0.01
RANGE OR LIST OF VALUES
DATA TYPE	decimal	alphanumeric	integer	alphanumeric
MISSING DATA CODES

VARIABLES (ATTRIBUTES):

COMPUTATIONAL METHODS:

Variable Name	Formula

Observations: In original data file. Text files contain no headings. Since 1995, data structure changed to counting species instead of measurements.

FOR DATA MANAGER USE ONLY

DATE OF LAST REVIEW: May 19, 2009
DATE OF LAST ENTRY: 07/17/03 and 12/16/03
STAGE OF DATA SET MANAGEMENT (dates):
RECEIVED: May 12, 1990
CATALOGUED: May 12, 1990
ON-LINE: May 14, 1997
REVIEWED BY RESEARCHER: June 1996
FILING MEDIA:
NAME OF DOCUMENTATION FILE: LTERDB18.FM1
NAME OF DATA FILE:
LA{aa}{##}mm.yy, where
{aa}={ES, RB, _J, My}
{##}={01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 10, 11}
mm= MONTH OF START DATE
yy= YEAR OF START DATE
NAME OF ON - LINE CATALOG: LTERDBAS
RECORD #: 18
DOCUMENT TYPE: data set (magnetic media)
PRIORITY TO BE ENTERED: second

Rev. date of this form: 22 Feb. 2002