Acadian Forest Productivity Index - Version 1

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Publication (Hennigar et al. 2016. Can. J. For. Res., 10.1139/cjfr-2016-0330)

Wall Map (pdf; 55Mb)

Raster layers (20 m; TIFF; ~300 MB each): Maine | New Brunswick | Prince Edward Island | Nova Scotia

You will need to superimpose non-productive land features and semi-productive bogs on this site map. The model does not predict the productivity of areas without trees. Where productivity is known to be poor or good, that local information will be more reliable than this map.

What is Biomass Growth Index (BGI)?

A measure of the maximum biomass growth rate (kg/ha/yr) of a forest area as a partial function of climate, soil, and topographic covariates.

Reference the Cooperative Forest Research Unit's 2016 Annual Report for details on methods and accuracy of predictions; or, contact Chris Hennigar at FORUS Research for the latest information on this work.

Why?

To provide a single quantitative measure of productivity for the majority of the Acadian forest region for the purposes of improving and also simplifying stand growth model forecasts.

This site map is currently being used as a covariate in the Open Stand Model for this area.

How reliable is it?

Not bad regionally, but local bias is quite prevalent due to: 1) inconsistencies between soil survey and mapping methods within and between jurisdictions; 2) SRTM digital elevation model (DEM) errors, especially locally where ground is relatively flat, which leads to incorrect micro-topography, water flow patterns, and depth to water; and 3) inability to completely factor out species and stand structure.

Future Work

As availability of LIDAR derived DEMs, better digital soil maps, and remote sensing information improves over the next few years, we hope to revisit this work.