An individual tree basal area increment model was developed for blue oak (Quercus douglasii Hook. & Arn.) in California, an important woodland tree for wildlife habitat. Box-Cox regression based on 895 increment cores that showed current basal area and the relative size of the tree crown were significant variables. Models to link basal area changes over time with tree height and crown cover wer...

Due to complexity, vegetation analysis and reconstruction of remote sensing data are challenging problems. Using architectural tree models combined with model inputs estimated from aerial image analysis, this paper presents an analysis– synthesis approach for urban vegetation detection, modeling, and reconstruction. Tree species, height, and crown size information are extracted by aerial image ...

The aim of this paper is twofold: to introduce the mathematics of stochastic differential equations (SDEs) for forest dynamics modeling and to describe how such a model can be applied to aid our understanding of tree height distribution corresponding to a given diameter using the large dataset provided by the Lithuanian National Forest Inventory (LNFI). Tree height-diameter dynamics was examine...

Site Index (SI), a key inventory parameter, is traditionally estimated by using costly and laborious field assessments of tree height and age. The increasing availability of reliable information on stand initiation timing and extent of planted, even-aged stands maintained in digital databases suggests that information on the height of dominant trees suffices for assessing SI. Light Detection an...

Forest trees show large changes in functional traits as they develop from a sapling in the shaded understorey to an adult in the light-exposed canopy. The adaptive function of such changes remains poorly understood. The carbon gain hypothesis suggests that these changes should be adaptive (acclimation) and that they serve to maximize net vegetative or reproductive growth. We explore the carbon ...

In this paper we present a airborne polarimetric interferometric SAR measurement campaign, carried out in Finland in 2003. The main aim of the FinSAR campaign was to validate POLinSAR tree height retrieval algorithms for boreal forest and it was arranged jointly by Helsinki University of Technology (TKK) and German Aerospace Center (DLR) Microwaves and Radar Institute. During the campaign airbo...

Several decades of research have shown that canopy gaps drive tree renewal processes in the temperate deciduous forest biome. In the literature, canopy gaps are usually defined as canopy openings that are created by partial or total tree death of one or more canopy trees. In this study, we investigate linkages between tree damage mechanisms and the formation or not of new canopy gaps in norther...

Canopy Height Model (CHM) is a standard LiDAR-derived product for deriving relevant forest inventory information, among which individual tree identification is a crucial task. The watershed algorithm from markers is the typical procedure applied to CHMs for delineation of crowns. However, for low-quality CHMs or under certain canopy conditions, segmentation at individual tree level is not pract...