Vegetation Classification of Selected Alaska Interior National Wildlife Refuges

The US Fish and Wildlife Service, Region 7 intends to award a single source financial assistance agreement as authorized by 505 DM 2.14 (B) to University of Alaska, Anchorage, Alaska Center for Conservation. This notice is not a request for proposals and the Government does not intend to accept proposals. This financial assistance opportunity is being issued under the Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit (CESU) Network: (http://www.cesu.psu.edu/materials/partners.htm). The CESU network provides research, technical assistance, and education to federal land management, environmental, and research agencies and their partners. The partners serve the biological, physical, social, cultural, and engineering disciplines needed to address natural and cultural resource management issues at multiple scales and in an ecosystem context. The US National Wildlife Refuge System Inventory & Monitoring (I&M) Branch collects data on the flora and vegetation of Refuge lands. These data are useful for describing Refuge biodiversity and can be used to develop a vegetation classification system which is undeveloped in Alaska. The I&M Branch of the National Wildlife Refuge System in Alaska announces the availability of $70,000 to analyze previously collected data on the flora of interior Alaska Refuges. UAA and the USFWS will work together to provide information to Refuge managers on the ecological and landscape context of their vegetation resources.