Browsing by Author "González Latorre, Eduardo"

Field work is needed to obtain reliable estimates when forest inventories are carried out. Field measurements traditionally have been the main source of information for inventories. But nowadays, also remotely sensed data collected using active or passive sensors mounted on satellite and aerial platforms are used to help in the estimation of forest parameters. Although the use of remotely sensed data is of great help in forest inventories, field data still plays a very important role as reference data, for results calibration and accuracy assessments. Considering that time and budget required for field work are generally some of the main concerns in forest inventory planning, the development of faster, cheaper, simpler, more accurate or more reliable field inventory methods and tools is a topic of great interest. TrestimaTM is a forest inventory system based in the interpretation of images taken with a mobilephone. Its accuracy and efficiency in estimating forest parameters was studied using sample plots in Russian. A total of 156 field plots were measured. The forest parameters measured were: the plot basal area and sample trees’ diameters and heights. The data collected with Trestima was meant to replicate a typical relascope sample plot inventory (variable radius plot inventory). Measurements obtained using traditional tools were used as reference data. The data collected for the inventory included plots at forest stands with different structures: from young to mature stands; and mixed stands to stands dominated by different species (most often Norway Spruce, Picea abies, (L.) H. Karst). The plots’ basal areas ranged from 7 to 62 m2/ha, the tree diameters from 3 to 60 cm and the tree heights from 3 to 35 m. The time used to measure the plots with the Trestima and the reference methods were collected. The data for each forest variable and the time invested in taking the measurements were organized as paired samples and compared using the statistic estimators of bias and RMSE, as the paired Student's t-test. Compared to the reference measurements, Trestima underestimated the basal area with a bias of 1.2 m2/ha (3.7%), but the differences were not statistically significant. In mixed stands, Trestima overestimated spruce basal area (bias of 13.9%), but for spruce dominated stands underestimated it (bias of 4.9%). Trestima overestimated tree diameters with a root mean squared error (RMSE) from 5.5 to 7.9%, depending on the tree species. but underestimated tree heights with an average RMSE of 3.7m (17.5%). The Trestima sample plot measurements were done faster than with traditional tools. Trestima measurements were in average 1.6 minutes (14.8%) faster. The Trestima system provided results comparable to the reference method for all the measured forest parameters. The worse results were obtained for the measurement of the tree heights. The interpretation of the results for the basal area, indicated that the system could benefit from taking into consideration stand structure, especially for species specific estimations. Trestima provided faster measurements of the forest parameters. One important advantage, is that Trestima produces automatically geographically referenced data, which can be used during later analysis, for example, interpretation of remotely sensed data or forest planning.