SuperSites

Calperum Mallee SuperSite

TERN’s Calperum Mallee SuperSite is in a mallee semi-arid ecosystem, fringing the River Murray floodplains on Calperum Station, near Renmark, South Australia. The area comprises undulating mallee woodlands and riverine vegetation alongside the river. All areas are in the process of recovering from extensive grazing. The Native Title for the area is held by the First Peoples of the River Murray and Mallee.

Site Infrastructure & Characteristics

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SuperSite Research Infrastructure
  • One eddy-covariance flux tower
  • Soil water content, temperature and electrical conductivity probes
  • Phenocams
  • Groundwater bores with nested piezometers
  • 18 x 1 ha Surveillance monitoring plots
  • Airborne LiDAR and hyperspectral imagery calibrated using SLATS star transects, leaf sampling, tree structure and LAI measurements
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SuperSite Details
  • Vegetation type: Mallee woodland
  • Elevation: ~67 m
  • Rainfall: ~265 mm/yr
  • Mean Temperature: ~17°C
  • Soils: Tenosols

Site Research

Research using the Calperum Mallee SuperSite aims to answer these key questions:

Featured Dataset

This dataset consists of measurements of the exchange of energy and mass between the surface and the atmospheric boundary-layer in a semi-arid mallee ecosystem north of the River Murray near Chowilla using eddy covariance techniques.

More Datasets

Site Partners

Research Publications

Since its inception, TERN’s infrastructure has enabled the publication of more than 1600 peer-reviewed scientific journal articles or books.