North Sterling NEON - United States of America

North Sterling (STER) is a relocatable terrestrial site is part of NEON's Central Plains Domain 10. STER is 100 miles to the east of CPER, is hosted by a private landowner with a strong interest in soil science and sustainable agriculture. The family farm has been in operation for nearly 100 years. Currently, the farm supports a mix of cattle grazing and field crops, primarily wheat, millet and hay. Remote sensing surveys of this field site collect lidar, spectrometer and high-resolution RGB camera data. The flux/meteorological tower at this site is 26ft with 4 measurement levels. The tower top extends above the vegetation canopy to allow sensors mounted at the top and along the tower to capture the full profile of atmospheric conditions from the top of the vegetation canopy to the ground. The tower collects physical and chemical properties of atmosphere-related processes, such as humidity, wind, and net ecosystem gas exchange. Precipitation data are collected by a tipping bucket at the top of the tower and a series of throughfalls located in the soil array. This site has five soil plots placed in an array within the airshed of the flux tower. Field ecologists collect the following types of observational data at this site: Terrestrial organisms (birds, ground beetles, mosquitoes, plants, small mammals, soil microbes, ticks), Biogeochemical data, and soil data. Total data products planned for this site: 113