Plant richness survey of mainland and barrier island locations along the Texas Gulf Coast in April and May 2005

I conducted a plant richness survey of 49 sites on the Texas Gulf Coast in the Spring (April-May) of 2005. Sites were chosen to include a range of mainland and barrier island locations. All sites were dominated by salt marsh plant species, primarily Spartina alterniflora. To provide a general indication of the salinity conditions prevailing at each site, I measured salinity of the nearest body of water with a refractometer on the date that the site was sampled. Plant richness was documented along a single 5.0m wide transect at each site. Each transect began at the lower elevational limit of vegetation and continued perpendicular to the water’s edge to the shrub community at the upper marsh border. Plant presence was noted in a series of nested subplots within a 1.0m x 5.0m plot at each meter along the transect. The results posted here are sites, position, salinity, and the site pool, or species encountered at the site. This data set is a companion to PLT-GCET-0608, which provides similar data for sites around Sapelo Island, Georgia.