Abstract
In forest inventory, trees are usually measured using handheld instruments; among the most relevant are calipers, inclinometers, ultrasonic devices, and laser range finders. Traditional forest inventory has been redesigned since modern laser scanner technology became available. Laser scanners generate massive data in the form of 3D point clouds. We have developed a novel methodology to provide estimates of the tree positions, stem diameters, and tree heights from these 3D point clouds. This dataset was made publicly accessible to test new software routines for the automatic measurement of forest trees using laser scanner data. Benchmark studies with performance tests of different algorithms are welcome. The dataset contains co-registered raw 3D point-cloud data collected on 20 forest inventory sample plots in Austria. The data were collected by two different laser scanning systems: (1) A mobile personal laser scanner (PLS) (ZEB Horizon, GeoSLAM Ltd., Nottingham, UK) and (2) a static terrestrial laser scanner (TLS) (Focus3D X330, Faro Technologies Inc., Lake Mary, FL, USA). The data also contain digital terrain models (DTMs), field measurements as reference data (ground-truth), and the output of recent software routines for the automatic tree detection and the automatic stem diameter measurement.
Highlights
Average per-area-unit values from the multiple sample plots are up-scaled to the entire survey region
The reference dataset is provided in a comma-separated values (CSV) file and contains the manual measurements of the single-tree attributes
This CSV file contains binary variables that indicate the automatic detection in the terrestrial laser scanner (TLS) and personal laser scanner (PLS) point clouds, providing the dbh estimates from various approaches; both were achieved with the methodology presented in Gollob et al [28]
Summary
The data were collected in the training areal of the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna, Austria (BOKU) located in the forest district Ofenbach near Forchtenstein village. Throughout the entire forest area, the BOKU Institute of Forest Growth maintains a permanently repeated measures forest inventory. The measurements of the total of 554 sample plots started in 1989, and each year, one-fifth 111 plots) of the total sample size is regularly remeasured. The sample plots were systematically aligned on a regular grid with a mesh width of 141.4 × 141.4 m. As a standard inventory method, Bitterlich relascope sampling [36,37,38] was conducted at each sample plot using a constant basal area factor of 4 m2/ha coupled with a lower dbh threshold of 5 cm
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
