Canadian National Vegetation Classification

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NatureServe Canada is leading a multi-agency/organization partnership to support the development of a national vegetation classification that defines and describes all terrestrial ecosystems. Currently, the CNVC project is being funded by Environment and Climate Change Canada with the goal of completing a synthesis of terrestrial (including wetland) ecosystem types by 2028.

What is the CNVC?

The Canadian National Vegetation Classification (CNVC) is a hierarchical classification that describes and classifies all of Canada’s terrestrial (including wetland) ecosystems, based on the integration of ecological drivers and vegetation properties at multiple scales. The classification can, in principle, describe all ecosystems in their current state, from natural to modified (e.g. old fields) to intensively managed (e.g. forest plantations), but the focus is on natural ecosystems. The primary goal is to capture the patterns of vegetation types across the landscape, from wetland shorelines and peatlands through mesic grasslands and rainforests to dry forests, rocky barrens, and tundra. Types at each level are systematically described using standardized names, specific definitions, and factsheet, and made publicly available to users.

Example of Canadian National Vegetation Classification using Great Lakes Alvar. A full set of levels are provided showing each type and subnational distribution across its range in Canada and the United States. Codes in parentheses provide a unique alphanumeric identifier for the type. The Conservation Data Centre in ON (Ontario Natural Heritage Information Program) has an equivalent type shown at the association level. Photo on far west side of Manitoulin Island by W.D. Bakowsky.

Significance

The primary purpose of the CNVC is to provide a consistent, systematic, and authoritative classification and description of Canadian ecosystems, based on integrating vegetation patterns and ecological processes. The CNVC is an important tool for coordinating the exchange of ecosystem information among multiple user groups (e.g. provincial, territorial and federal governments, NGOs) to support research and land management activities in the following ways:
• Serve as a standardized ecological framework, linked to jurisdictional classifications
• Provide ecologically meaningful units for reporting
• Support monitoring and predicting change
• Inform ecosystem-based management in the context of ecological land classifications such as the Canadian Terrestrial Ecological Framework
• Assist in conservation planning to assess status and trends in ecosystem condition, loss, and restoration.

National and Jurisdictional Collaboration

The CNVC project relies on extensive collaboration and investments by provincial, territorial, federal governments, and conservation organizations. All project activities are coordinated by the CNVC Technical Committee, which has representation from across agencies and organizations. The committee meets regularly to review progress towards meeting the goal of a national synthesis of Canada’s vegetation. In the past, the Committee collectively focused on vegetation types within the boreal forest biome, which stretches across all jurisdictions in Canada. Recently, the Committee has established Regional Work Groups across Canada to compile, analyze, and refine vegetation types within the distinct biomes of each regions.

Regional Work Groups and their focus areas within major biomes.

The NatureServe Canada Network – Conservation Data Centres

NatureServe Canada plays a key role in the application of the Canadian National Vegetation Classification through its commitment to advance ecosystem assessments across Canadian jurisdictions. Through its Network of Conservation Data Centres (CDCs), NatureServe Canada works to acquire, review, update, and maintain standard classification, mapping, and status assessments for ecosystems in Canada.The CNVC data are housed within the Biotics database, maintained by NatureServe Canada and NatureServe (North America), and the database is routinely updated in collaboration with partners. The goal is to ensure that the CNVC information remains accessible and useful for conservation planning and natural resource management within each jurisdiction and across the country.

International Collaboration

The release of the Global Ecosystem Typology (GET) [link] by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) presented an opportunity to revisit the CNVC hierarchy and NatureServe’s International Vegetation Classification (IVC), which share a common ecosystem classification approach, called “EcoVeg”. Through extensive collaborations between authors of the GET and EcoVeg approaches, a biome-based revision to the CNVC was produced that builds on the strengths of GET for global terrestrial types and the CNVC for continental to local terrestrial ecosystems [link] (Figure 3). The revisions provide more robust opportunities for co-application of the CNVC, IVC and GET in the terrestrial realm for management, conservation, and restoration.

Alignment of the Global Ecosystem Typology (GET) and the Canadian National Vegetation Classification (CNVC). The Realm and Biome levels are the same, although GET includes all Realms (Terr = Terrestrial, Fre = Freshwater, Mar = Marine, and Sub = Subterranean), whereas CNVC is focused on the Terrestrial. GET provides types at broad scales for all ecosystems (left grey bar), but does not provide units at lower levels; the CNVC only provides types for terrestrial ecosystems, but does so at all levels, with units complete at broad levels (right grey bar, comparable to GET units) to increasingly incomplete at lower levels (right stippled bars).

CNVC 2022-2028 Project

Goals

Classify:

  • Develop standardized terrestrial vegetation types for Canada.
  • Classify Canadian vegetation at various levels of generalization, from biomes (e.g. Temperate-Boreal Grassland & Shrubland) to regional (e.g., Great Lakes Alvar) and local plant communities (Northern Dropseed – Little Bluestem Alvar Grassland) (see Figure 1).
  • Describe each types using factsheets, and make them publicly available.

Coordinate:

  • Engage Canadian government agencies and partners with relevant expertise, data and jurisdictional authority in order to complete and map the classification with the greatest degree of national consensus.
  • Coordinate and correlate CNVC vegetation types with Canadian provincial, territorial and regional classifications, as well as with the U.S. National Vegetation Classification (USNVC) and the Global Ecosystem Typology.
  • Support survey and mapping of CNVC in collaboration with federal, provincial, and territorial agencies and NGOs.

Communicate:

  • Communicate to a wide audience of potential users the need for, and utility of, a standardized national classification of vegetation types for Canada.
  • Provide publicly accessible descriptions of Canadian vegetation types.
Project Updates

Prior

2019:  Standards for development of CNVC and a comprehensive list of CNVC macrogroups

2020:  Completion of eastern Boreal forest types, drafts of western boreal and all temperate forest types

Current April 2022 – March 2028

2022:  Preliminary synthesis of CNVC groups, alliances, and associations within CNVC macrogroups.

2023:  Several projects:

  • Assignment of alliances to Quebec temperate forest types;
  • Description of Newfoundland’s non-forested types

2024:  Several projects:

  • Grasslands analysis in Prairie Provinces (AB, MB, SK); 
  • Grasslands of Canada report and at risk Assessment (in support from Canadian Forage and Grassland Association)

2025:  Several projects

  • Description of all temperate vegetation types in Prairie Provinces (AB, MB, and SK)
  • Review of Arctic vegetation types in context of Circumboreal Arctic Vegetation Map and Alaskan Arctic team review.
  • Assessment of Rocky Mountain vegetation in Alberta
  • Quantitative vegetation analysis workshop
  • Preparation for revisions to cnvc-cnvc.org website. 

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