Plants of Concern provides standardized, rapid floristic quality assessment (RFQA) protocols for two projects:
These assessments provide plant community metrics useful in evaluating ecological quality and informing adaptive management of natural areas over time.
See Floristic Quality Assessment in the Chicago Region and Application Computer Programs by Gerould S. Wilhelm and Linda Masters, 1995 for more information about the development of FQA.
Plants of Concern used the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency’s Rapid FQA protocol (MNRFQA) for wetland habitats (Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) 2012 & 2014) as a template for these protocols. The MPCA protocol relies on timed, meander-based sampling of common, easy to identify species that affect overall floristic quality.