Connection between forest inventory data and geographic information systems for assessing timber value at the stand level
Résumé
Recent developments in the modelling of tree growth and wood quality have produced new models and software packages that enable the simulation of timber properties, usually at the stand level. Separately foresters are now deeply involved in the development and implementation of GIS concerning forest yield, vegetation, soil properties, climatic variables etc. To our knowledge there is no wood quality information available in such data base. The objective of this work is to demonstrate that it is possible to establish a linkage between these Growth and Wood Quality models and the available forest geographic information. We intend to present a method which enables to produce for the French Vosges mountain area (i) a map of forest ecological conditions (which combine climatic, trophic and hydric characteristics of sites), (ii) a map of the sawn timber properties for Norway spruce stands and (iii) a realistic 3D representation of trees for one or more selected stands. The software involved for this work are (i) AMAP that allows to simulate and to stage 3D shapes of plants including tree species, (ii) ARCINFO© a commercial GIS, (iii) IMAGIS which interfaces AMAP and GIS in order to represent GIS information in a realistic way, (iv) WinEPIFN® which simulates the board properties from one stand described by usual forest inventory measurements.