Introduction

Data on a specific feature is often collected at a variety of points across a landscape, this data is used to create maps that show the feature as continuous.  In this study maps will be created by using Inverse Distance Weighting and averaging values over a forest polygon.  These methods will be compared to see if they produce similar maps.

Following a forest disturbance it is useful to predict the number of seedlings that will grow into an area as this allows for predictions of what the forest may be like in the future and whether or not it is necessary to plant trees in certain areas to help with forest regeneration.

For this project I looked at three different factors to see if they can be used to predict the number of seedlings that will grow in an area.  The factors that were looked at were site series, basal area, and stand height.

Definitions:

Site Series:  A measurement of soil moisture and the soil nutrient level (Ministry of Forests, 2003)

Basal area:  A measurement of the cross sectional area of trees per hectare (Nix, No date)

Stand Height:  A measurement of the height of the dominant trees in the stand.

 

Study Site:

The Study Site is Stanley Park in Vancouver, British Columbia.  Data was gathered from 190 different plots and used for the analysis.  Stanley Park receives large blow down events fairly regularly, the most recent event being in 2006 (Kheraj, 2007)

Knowing future regeneration in Stanley Park is very important as the park makes lots of efforts to look like a “natural” forest that does not show major disturbances or human influences (Kheraj, 2007)

Works Cited:

Kheraj, Sean.  2007.  Restoring nature: Ecology, memory, and the storm history of Vancouver’s Stanley Park.  Canadian historical review, 88(4), 577-612.

Ministry of Forests. 2003.  A field guide to site identification and interpretation for the Southeast portion of the Prince George forest region.  Land Management Handbook.  http://www.llbc.leg.bc.ca/public/pubdocs/bcdocs/361056/lmh51.pdf

Nix, Steve.  No date.  Basal Area.  About.com Forestry.  http://forestry.about.com/cs/glossary/g/basal_area.htm