Forecasting alpine plant communities’ responses to environmental change is critical in the face of contemporary climate shifts and changing disturbance regimes. The Australian Alps, known for their high endemism and fine-scale habitat heterogeneity, are undergoing significant ecological transitions—including the encroachment of woody species into herbfields and grasslands. However, forecasting alpine vegetation change remains challenging due to the scarcity of spatially explicit, long-term data to quantify these changes.

This PhD project leverages a unique long-term vegetation monitoring dataset, first established in 1945 by Carr and Turner, comprising 55 permanent transects across the Australian alpine region. Monitored at annual, five-year, and ten-year intervals, and now spanning nearly eight decades, these records offer a rare opportunity to assess vegetation change over time and evaluate the influence of key environmental drivers, including climate, fire, and microhabitat variation.

Using this dataset, we aim to quantify rates and patterns of vegetation change, identify the environmental correlates of shrub expansion, and investigate shifts in species composition, cover, and community structure. These analyses will inform the parameterisation of predictive models of species and vegetation dynamics, grounded in empirical patterns and supported by demographic and experimental data.

By integrating long-term monitoring with process-based and demographic modelling approaches, this project will enhance our ability to forecast future alpine vegetation dynamics and guide management strategies for these sensitive ecosystems under changing climatic and disturbance regimes.