A Hierarchical Binary Process Model to Assess Deviation from Desired Ecological Condition across a Broad Forested Landscape in Alabama

Pete Bettinger, Krista Merry and Jonathan Stober
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Pete Bettinger: Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources, University of Georgia, 180 E. Green Street, Athens, GA 30602, USA
Krista Merry: Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources, University of Georgia, 180 E. Green Street, Athens, GA 30602, USA
Jonathan Stober: U.S. Forest Service, Talladega National Forest, 45 Highway 281, Heflin, AL 36264, USA

Land, 2022, vol. 11, issue 6, 1-14

Abstract: This work describes the development and analysis of a spatially explicit environmental model to estimate the current, ecological, condition class of a managed forest landscape in the southern United States. The model could be extendable to other similar temperate forest landscapes, yet is characterized as a problem-specific, hierarchical, binary process model given the explicit relationships it recognizes between the management of southern United States pine-dominated natural forests and historical ecological conditions. The model is theoretical, based on informed proposals of the landscape processes that influence the ecological condition, and their relationship to perceived ecological condition. The modeling effort is based on spatial data that describe the historical forest community classes, forest plan provisions, fire history, silvicultural treatments, and current vegetation conditions, and six potential ecological condition classes (ECC) are assigned to lands. A case study was provided involving a large national forest, and validation of the outcomes of the modelling effort suggested that the overall accuracy when predicting the exact ecological condition class was about 46%, while the overall accuracy ±1 class was about 81%. For large, heterogeneous forest areas, issues remain in estimating the input variables relatively accurately, particularly the pine basal area.

Keywords: binary process model; temperate forests; pine ecosystems; ecological condition (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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