Management Area Surveys
Fairfax Tree Rescuers PRISM
Updated June 14, 2025
These surveys are designed for experienced people to map invasives in a specific natural area for management purposes. You should take your time! There is seldom a need to completely survey a park all at one time. You can do it over multiple sessions. And the point of it is to be useful for management, so do as much or as little as you want to for that purpose.
Please do, however, at some point create a polygon that shows the extent of the natural area you are working on. Do that by creating a record for any one species with the searched area being the area’s boundary and the species location being a point, line, or polygon within the searched area. Under the project field, include “Search for severe infestations” (Project 1690).
Please first see general instructions for using the web-based and mobile app versions.
As a general rule, surveyors should create one iMap location record (polygon or point) for each species surveyed.
Use polygons to document the most serious infestations, such as these.
- Stands of shrubs or trees that are taking over an area.
- Ground-level plants that are obliterating (or likely to obliterate) everything underneath them, such as a bunch of Lesser Celandine or Wavyleaf Grass, or a large, impenetrable mat of Japanese Honeysuckle.
- Serious vine infestations -In the case of vines we call it “serious” when they are an imminent threat to multiple trees (or in the case of Wisteria or Kudzu, simply present). We recognize that young vines are a future threat, but the focus of this particular project is on the most severe infestations.
Knowing where the most serious infestations are occurring will help our community to prioritize treatment and to monitor our progress.
Use points to document scattered targets, if there is a reason to point them out. Examples might include:
- Something you want a contractor to know about
- A couple of Tree-of-Heaven specimens
- Early detection in your area of a serious invasive that should be dealt with ASAP.
- One example of each of the common invasive species, just to document that they exist in your natural area.
Use lines for infestations that follow along a trail, boundary, stream bank, etc.
Project numbers:
- 1625 VDOT rights of way - all
- 1626 VDOT rights of way - inaccessible to volunteers
- 1634 City of Fairfax Parks
- 1633 Clifton, VA parks including CBA
- 1629 Commercial properties
- 1630 Fairfax Board of Supervisors land
- 1635 Town of Herndon parks
- 1637 Town of Vienna parks
- 1640 Faith communities
- 1636 Falls Church, VA parks
- 1627 FCPA properties
- 1632 FCPS (Fairfax County Public Schools)
- 1628 HOA common land
- 1631 Multi-dwelling unit common land
- 1638 NOVA Parks
- 1639 Single family home properties
- 1642 National Park Service (NPS)
- 1643 Military
- 1644 Railroad rights of way
- 1645 Federal lands
- 1646 State parks
- 1647 Severe vine infestations
- 1685 Severe tree infestations
- 1686 Severe shrub infestations
- 1687 Severe ground-level infestations
- 1690 Search for severe infestations