Forest Cover Types Research Articles

Discrimination of crown closure of forest ecosystems using different remotely sensed data: a case study of Kızılcasu planning unit

The objective of this study was to estimate crown closure using different satellite images, Landsat TM and QuickBird. As reference data, forest cover type map were used in the study, and two different methods were used to determine the crown closure. First, to classify crown closures from satellite images, a supervised classification method was used. Second, the linear mixture modeling (LMM) fuzzy classification method was used to determine the stand crown closure. Landsat TM and QuickBird data were used in this frame. The training dataset was derived from a fine spatial resolution land cover classification of QuickBird imagery. This classification was combined to estimate the percentage crown closure in Landsat TM spatial resolution. The research also focused on classifying and mapping the crown closure classes with the spatial analysis functions of geographical information systems (GIS). The results showed that the QuickBird image had the highest classification accuracies compared to the spatial analyses results of Landsat TM and fuzzy classification.

Thresholds in forest bird richness in response to three types of forest cover in Ontario, Canada

Identification of threshold values in avian responses to habitat loss provides science-based guidelines on how to best manage anthropogenically altered landscapes for wildlife preservation. Our objectives were to test for thresholds in species richness of forest-breeding birds in relation to deciduous, coniferous, mixed, and total forest cover in two landscapes varying in the amount of forest present, and to determine whether thresholds for each forest type were coincident within and among landscapes, and across two spatial scales. We used Ontario Breeding Bird Atlas data to calculate species richness of forest-breeding birds. Percent deciduous, coniferous, mixed, and total forest cover were determined in 250 m radius circles around survey locations (local scale) and for 10 × 10 km squares (landscape scale) in the fragmented, sparsely forested Mixedwood Plains ecozone and in the more continuously forested Ontario Shield ecozone. Best-fit models explaining variation in species richness were selected from candidate sets of models that included 1–6 variables in addition to segmented or linear terms for forest cover. Threshold models had support at the local and landscape scales, and for all forest types. Thresholds ranged from 4 to 45 % cover, being slightly higher in the more continuously forested landscape, and for more prevalent forest types. Thresholds can provide useful targets for conservation efforts, but it is crucial to recognize that habitat levels should be maintained above threshold values to avoid ecological degradation, and to address the habitat requirements of species with occupancy thresholds above those of the assemblage.

Assessing land clearing potential in the Canadian agriculture–forestry interface with a multi-attribute frontier approach

The pattern of forest land clearing in a region can be viewed as a gauge of sustainable (or unsustainable) use of agricultural and forest resources. In this study we examine the geographical distribution of land clearing potential in the Canadian agriculture–forestry interface and propose a new landscape-scale indicator that quantifies this potential. We consider the possibility that forested land will be cleared for agriculture as a trade-off between the land's capacity to support agriculture and its comparative value if it remains forested. However, this trade-off is complicated by the land's susceptibility to fragmentation (and subsequent conversion), which derives from the local pattern of forest, agriculture and other land cover types. We find the locations in the agriculture–forestry interface with the highest land clearing potential by delineating nested multi-attribute frontiers in the dimensions of the land's agricultural capacity, its estimated forest productivity and its fragmentation potential. The multi-attribute frontier concept addresses our lack of knowledge about the relative importance of these multiple drivers of land conversion by objectively combining them into a single-dimensional land clearing pressure metric in a geographical setting. Overall, our approach provides a simple yet informative indicator which reveals the geographical stratification of land clearing pressures across large regions. In general, the spatial delineation of areas with high land clearing potential agrees well with recent evidence of land clearing and deforestation events in Canada.

Herbivory and seedling establishment in Pyrenean forests: Influence of micro- and meso-habitat factors on browsing pressure

Browsing damage is among the most determinant factors that limit the establishment of tree seedlings in forests. In some areas, this process leads to massive mortalities that can reduce or even completely prevent the regeneration of some tree species. Mediterranean mountain forests have undergone during the last decades important changes in land-uses that have significantly altered the type and abundance of herbivore populations. In this study we assessed the impact of current grazing conditions in forest regeneration using a set of experimental plantations established in the Eastern Pyrenees in areas visited by domestic livestock (cattle and horses) and wild ungulates (mainly roe deer and chamois). We analyzed during 4years the role of seedling species and size, mesohabitat (elevation and type of forest cover) and microhabitat (herbaceous cover, distance to shrub, and light availability) on the browsing-induced mortality of more than 500 seedlings of Pinus sylvestris, Pinus uncinata, Betula pendula and Abies alba, the most common tree species in the study area. Browsing-induced mortality for the three conifer species was much lower (<15%) than the one observed for B. pendula (>40%) and depended on both microhabitat – mainly on the distance to protective elements such as shrubs; and mesohabitat, with an interaction between the elevational belt (site) and the type of forest cover (gaps vs. understory). In the subalpine belt, browsing on A. alba and P. uncinata was higher during summer at plots located in the forest understory whereas, during winter, it was higher at plots located in gaps. The study shows that both mesohabitat and microhabitat can exert an effect on the patterns of plant damage by herbivores, providing useful information to adapt forest management in areas particularly exposed to them.

Assessing soil quality under different land cover types within shifting agriculture in South Cameroon

The common agricultural practice in the humid tropical forest zone of Cameroon is shifting cultivation, which leads to a landscape mosaic system characterized by a diversity of land cover types. Our objective was to evaluate soil properties and soil quality under these land cover types and to investigate on their interrelationships. Topsoil samples (0–20cm) were collected at the same time from 8 different land cover types (bare soil with burned vegetation biomass (FR1), bare soil with unburned vegetation biomass (FR), Chromolaena odorata fallow (JC), bush ligneous fallow (JR), secondary forest (SF), primary forest (FC), Gilbertiodendron dewevrei forest (FG), and raffia and Uapacca forest (RA)) and analysed for routine laboratory determinations. A soil quality index (SQI) computed based on soil chemical properties, analysis of variance and multiple comparison tests were used to compare soils from different land cover types. Principal component analysis (PCA) was used to select the most appropriate indicators that control soil quality. Several soil properties showed high to very high coefficient of variation within the land cover types. Organic matter was significantly high under forested land cover types (FC, FG, RA) and under bare soil with burned vegetation (FR1). Soil quality differs significantly (p=0.000) from one land cover to another and shows the following ranking: SQI_FR1≫SQI_FG>SQI_RA>SQI_FR>SQI_FC>SQI_JC>SQI_FS>SQI_JR. Organic matter (OM), available P, calcium (Ca), and pHw combined, accounted for 88.5% of the variation of soil quality. The soil quality appeared to be highly influenced by ashes from burned vegetation biomass which temporally enriches soils with nutrient elements and by the organic matter supplied by forested land cover types.

Effect of size and surrounding forest vegetation on chemical properties of soil in forest gaps

Abstract: Forest gaps have different microclimatic conditions as compared to the surrounding areas, depending on gap size and surrounding forest types and affecting the biological, chemical, physical, and hydrological processes in the forest openings. The objective of this study was to determine the effect of forest gap size and surrounding forest cover type (beech or mixed stands) on the soil of forest opening by analyzing several soil chemical soil properties (pH, electrical conductivity - EC, organic matter - OM, and nutrient content). The study was conducted in the Yuvacik watershed in Izmit (Turkey) and a total of 31 forest gaps of different size (1.44-37.33 ha) and elevations (848-1169 m a.s.l.) were studied. Gaps were divided into three groups with size 0-5 ha, 5-15 ha, and >15 ha. Results showed that forest gap size significantly affected all the investigated chemical properties of the soil, except for soil pH. As gap size increased, sodium (Na+) concentration in the soil decreased from 22.72 to 19.57 mg L-1 while potassium (K+) and magnesium (Mg+2) concentrations increased from 83.88 to 134.62 mg L-1 and from 59.46 to 123.96 mg L-1, respectively. Medium-sized gap soils had the lowest OM content, as well as the lowest calcium (Ca+2) and nitrogen (N+3) concentrations. Surrounding forest types significantly influenced soil chemical properties in the openings, except for EC, N+3, and phosphorus (P-PO4-3). Soils in the gaps surrounded by mixed forest had significantly lower pH but higher OM content, K+, Na+, Ca+2, and Mg+2 concentrations than soils in beech forest gaps.

Stand development patterns of forest cover types in the natural forests of northern Baekdudaegan in South Korea

The purpose of this study was to classify current forest cover types, and to investigate stand development patterns for natural forests in six areas in northern Baekdudaegan, South Korea. Twenty-eight independent forest communities were aggregated into eight forest cover types by species composition in the overstory of each forest community. The forest cover types were of mixed mesophytic, “others” deciduous, Quercus mongolica dominant, Q. mongolica pure, Pinus densiflora–Q. mongolica, P. densiflora, Betula ermanii, and Q. mongolica–P. koraiensis. The ecological information was organized by importance value and species diversity for each forest type. Based on the correlation between species diversity index and the abundance of Q. mongolica plus P. densiflora for corresponding forest cover types, we compared the developmental process and approximate successional pathway between each cover type. The P. densiflora forest cover type changes into the P. densiflora–Q. mongolica cover type, followed by the Q. mongolica dominant cover type through continuous invasion of the oak trees. Furthermore, the Q. mongolica pure cover type would spread toward the Q. mongolica dominant cover type with a mixture of various deciduous tree species. The Q. mongolica dominant cover type progresses through the other deciduous cover types to the mixed mesophytic cover type with diversified composition and structure. On the mid to lower slopes, with loamy soils and good moisture conditions, various deciduous forest types should progress, by ecological succession, toward the mixed mesophytic cover type without any further disturbance.

Energy Efficient Data Mining Scheme for High Dimensional Data

In this paper, we propose energy efficient big data mining scheme for forest cover type and gas drift classification. Efficient machine learning and data mining techniques provide unprecedented opportunity to monitor and characterize physical environments, such as forest cover type, using low cost wireless sensor networks. The experimental validation on two different sensor network datasets, forest cover type and gas sensor array drift dataset from publicly available UCI machine learning repository. Coupled with an appropriate feature selection, the complete scheme leads towards an energy efficient protocol for intelligent monitoring of large physical environments instrumented with wireless sensor networks.

The effects of forest cover type and bedrock on the streamwater chemistry at the Irumukeppu mountains in central Hokkaido

The effects of forest cover type and bedrock on the streamwater chemistry at the Irumukeppu mountains in central Hokkaido

Forest Cover Changes in the Three-North Shelter Forest Region of China during 1990 to 2005

The Three-North Shelter Forest Region (TNSFR) of China exhibits obvious forest cover changes that have been caused by numerous government-led afforestation and reforestation projects in recent decades. This study investigated the forest cover changes in the TNSFR during 1990-2005 based on a land cover dataset developed by the Chinese Academy of Science using remote sensing data and analyzed its relationship with meteorological change trends. The results indicated that the total forest area increased by 1.64 million ha (26.98 to 28.62 million ha) from 1990 to 2005. The composition of forest cover types of dense forest, shrubs, sparse forest and other forest remained approximately consistent over time, and the dominant cover type was dense forest. There was a uniform spatial distribution of forest cover change. The forest cover in North and Northeast China changed dramatically from 1990 to 2005, but the changes in Meng-Xin and on the Loess Plateau were not as extensive. The afforestation and reforestation projects made great strides toward increasing forest cover, whereas forest fires, forest harvesting and deforestation caused by urban and farm-land expansion led to decreases in forest cover. The annual average temperature and precipitation had clearly changed, and increased forest cover could slow down the rate of climate change to some extent in this region. Proper planning and implementation of afforestation and reforestation projects were essential to improving the-natural conditions in the TNSFR. Information about the actual forest cover changes would help in the design of appropriate forestry policies and sustainable forest management strategies.

Forest Cover Types Classification Based on Online Machine Learning on Distributed Cloud Computing Platforms of Storm and SAMOA

Storm is the most popular realtime stream processing platform, which can be used to deal with online machine learning. Similar to how Hadoop provides a set of general primitives for doing batch processing, Storm provides a set of general primitives for doing realtime computation. SAMOA includes distributed algorithms for the most common machine learning tasks like Mahout for Hadoop. SAMOA is both a platform and a library. In this paper, Forest cover types, a large benchmaking dataset available at the UCI KDD Archive is used as the data stream source. Vertical Hoeffding Tree, a parallelizing streaming decision tree induction for distributed enviroment, which is incorporated in SAMOA API is applied on Storm platform. This study compared stream prcessing technique for predicting forest cover types from cartographic variables with traditional classic machine learning algorithms applied on this dataset. The test then train method used in this system is totally different from the traditional train then test. The results of the stream processing technique indicated that it’s output is aymptotically nearly identical to that of a conventional learner, but the model derived from this system is totally scalable, real-time, capable of dealing with evolving streams and insensitive to stream ordering.

Accuracy Assessment of Land Cover Maps of Forests within an Urban and Rural Environment

Land cover maps of forests within an urban and rural environment derived from high spatial resolution multispectral data (QuickBird) and medium spatial resolution multispectral data (Landsat ETM+ and SPOT 4) were compared to ascertain whether increased spatial resolution increases map accuracy of forests and whether map accuracy varies across land cover classification schemes. It is commonly assumed that increased spatial resolution would probably increase land cover map accuracy regardless of land cover classification methodology. This study assessed whether that assumption is correct within a rural and an urban environment. Map accuracy for modified National Land Cover Data (NLCD) 2001 Level II, Level I, and Unique (a modified NLCD 2001 Level II and Level I combination) shows that 30-m Landsat ETM+ data had the highest overall map accuracy for rural, urban, and combined rural/urban land cover maps. Analysis of user's and producer's accuracies shows that Landsat ETM+ data had higher levels of producer's accuracy of >90.0% for the coniferous cover type for modified NLCD 2001 Level II and Unique, excluding one instance for which SPOT 4 had a user's accuracy of 98.5% for the rural coniferous cover type. Modified NLCD 2001 Level I Landsat ETM+ data had user's and producer's accuracies for a homogeneous forest cover type of 98.4 and 90.6%, respectively. Landsat ETM+ data also outperformed SPOT 4 and QuickBird within an urban environment, creating the only map products with forest cover type user's and producer's accuracies of >90.0%.

Cluster 분석에 의한 백두대간 남부권역 천연림의 산림 분류

본 연구는 백두대간 남부권역의 황악산, 박석산, 덕유산, 지리산 등 네 지역을 대상으로 복잡 다양한 천연림 군집을 분류하고 산림피복유형을 집약하였다. 점표본법을 이용하여 851개의 표본점에서 식생자료를 수집하였다. 조사된 식생자료를 대상으로 Cluster 분석을 실시하여 총 18개 군집으로 분류하였으며, 분류된 군집의 상층 수종 구성의 유사성을 바탕으로 중생혼합림형, 기타활엽수림형, 굴참나무-졸참나무림형, 신갈나무림형, 소나무림형, 서어나무림형, 구상나무림형 등 총 7개의 산림피복유형으로 집약하였다. 연구 대상지에서 신갈나무림형이 가장 넓게 분포하였고, 위도가 낮아질수록 신갈나무림형이 분포하는 평균해발고는 높아졌다. 중생혼합림형과 기타활엽수림형은 계곡에 많이 분포하였고, 신갈나무림형과 소나무림형은 능선 부위에 많이 분포하는 경향이 있었다. This study was carried out to classify forest communities and to aggregate forest cover types for the complex and diversified natural forest areas of Hwangaksan, Bakseoksan, Deogyusan, and Jirisan in southern region of Baekdudaegan Mountains. The vegetation data were collected by point-centered quarter sampling method. Eight hundred fifty one sample points were subjected to cluster analysis to classify 18 forest communities, which were aggregated into 7 representative forest cover types on the basis of community similarity from composition of canopy species. They were mixed mesophytic forest cover type, the others deciduous forest cover type, Quercus variabilis-Quercus serrata cover type, Quercus mongolica cover type, Pinus densiflora cover type, Carpinus laxiflora cover type, and Abies koreana cover type. The Quercus mongolica cover type was most widely distributed in the study areas, and this cover type tended to occur in the place of higher altitude as latitude was getting lower. Mixed mesophytic forest and the others deciduous forest cover type were commonly distributed in the areas of valley, on the other hand, Quercus mongolica cover type and Pinus densiflora cover type tended to be distributed in the areas of ridge.

Characterizing effects of landscape and morphometric factors on water quality of reservoirs using a self-organizing map

Understanding the pattern of reservoir water quality in relation to morphometry and other landscape characteristics can provide insight into water quality management. We investigated the water quality of 302 reservoirs distributed nationwide in Korea by classifying them using a self-organizing map (SOM), examining how hydrogeomorphometry variables are related to reservoir water quality, and evaluating the effects of variables at different categories including geology, land cover, hydromorphology, and physicochemistry on reservoir water quality through a theoretical path model. The SOM classified the reservoirs into six clusters, from least to most polluted, with differences in physicochemical and hydrogeomorphometry variables between clusters. Water quality exhibits strong relationships with the proportions of urban, agricultural, and forest land cover types in the watersheds. Finally, our results revealed that hydrogeomorphometry of reservoirs and percentages of land cover types within watersheds have a considerable impact on the water quality of adjacent aquatic ecosystems.

English

The present study was carried out to examine the applicability of Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) in estimating daily discharge and sediment delivery from mountainous forested watersheds and to assess the impact of forest cover types on stream discharge pattern and sediment load. The study watersheds namely Arnigad and Bansigad, comprising of dense Oak forest (80%) and degraded Oak forest (83%) respectively, are located in&nbsp;lesser lower&nbsp;Himalaya (India). Apart from hill topography, deforestation in the watersheds results in huge loss of productive soil and water as runoff. Daily discharge, sediment concentration and other hydro-meteorological data were monitored at the outlet of each watershed. SWAT was calibrated and validated for daily discharge and sediment concentration using the observed data. The performance of the model was evaluated using the statistical measures of coefficient of determination (R2) and Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency (ENS). The statistical analysis of calibration results for Arnigad watershed showed very good agreement between observed and simulated daily values, with an R2 value of 0.91, and an ENS of 84.48% in discharge simulation; and an R2 value of 0.89, and an ENS of 83.11% in sediment simulation. The model also exhibited high performance on Bansigad watershed with an R2 value of 0.91, and an ENS of 89.74% in discharge simulation; and an R2 value of 0.86, and an ENS of 82.07% in sediment simulation. The model performed equally well on validation data and estimated the discharge and sediment yield very close to the observed data. The simulated mean annual water yield and sediment yield were also comparable to observed values in both the watersheds. The mean annual surface runoff and water yield over the entire study period were simulated as 6 and 59.4% respectively of the mean annual rainfall in Arnigad watershed; and 6.9 and 63.7% respectively in Bansigad watershed. The results of the study indicated that SWAT is capable of estimating the discharge and sediment yield from Himalayan forested watersheds and can be a useful tool for assessing hydrology and sediment yield response of the watersheds in the region. Key words: Oak forest, soil and water assessment tool (SWAT), discharge, sediment concentration, calibration, water yield.

차연산과 분광미분을 이용한 항공 초분광영상의 식생지수 산출 적절밴드 선택

ABSTRACT Recently the various applications and spectral indices development of airborne hyperspectral imagery(A-HSI) has been increased. Especially the vegetation indices (VIs) were used to verify stress and vigor of vegetation. The VIs needs two or more spectral bands selectively to calculate as NIR(near infrared) and red wavelength. The A-HIS has specific band characteristics as narrow, continues and many. The A-HIS has narrow, continues and many specific band characteristics. That could be make it confuse which of bands could be explained for appropriate vegetation characteristics. If the A-HIS bands is not the same the wavelength with VIs’development band setting, then it need a selection adequate for spectral characteristics of target vegetation. Therefore we set 4 substitute bands for NIR and red wavelength respectively and calculated two VIs combined with substitute bands such as NDVI(normalized difference vegetation index) and MSRI(modified simple ratio index). To consider the variation of each VIs, we adapted the image differencing method of change detection technique. Also, we used spectral derivative to identify appropriate bands for spectral characteristics of digital forest cover type map. The result of adequate bands for two VIs selected red #3 as 680.2nm and NIR #2 as 801.7nm. This wavelength was good for any forest type in low variations.KEYWORDS : Airborne Hyperspectral Imagery, Band Selection, Vegetation Index, Image Differencing, Spectral Derivative

Models of regional habitat quality and connectivity for pumas (Puma concolor) in the southwestern United States.

The impact of landscape changes on the quality and connectivity of habitats for multiple wildlife species is of global conservation concern. In the southwestern United States, pumas (Puma concolor) are a well distributed and wide-ranging large carnivore that are sensitive to loss of habitat and to the disruption of pathways that connect their populations. We used an expert-based approach to define and derive variables hypothesized to influence the quality, location, and permeability of habitat for pumas within an area encompassing the entire states of Arizona and New Mexico. Survey results indicated that the presence of woodland and forest cover types, rugged terrain, and canyon bottom and ridgeline topography were expected to be important predictors of both high quality habitat and heightened permeability. As road density, distance to water, or human population density increased, the quality and permeability of habitats were predicted to decline. Using these results, we identified 67 high quality patches across the study area, and applied concepts from electronic circuit theory to estimate regional patterns of connectivity among these patches. Maps of current flow among individual pairs of patches highlighted possible pinch points along two major interstate highways. Current flow summed across all pairs of patches highlighted areas important for keeping the entire network connected, regardless of patch size. Cumulative current flow was highest in Arizona north of the Colorado River and around Grand Canyon National Park, and in the Sky Islands region owing to the many small habitat patches present. Our outputs present a first approximation of habitat quality and connectivity for dispersing pumas in the southwestern United States. Map results can be used to help target finer-scaled analyses in support of planning efforts concerned with the maintenance of puma metapopulation structure, as well as the protection of landscape features that facilitate the dispersal process.

Response of Phytophagous Bats to Patch Quality and Landscape Attributes in Fragmented Tropical Semi-Deciduous Forest

Forest fragmentation reduces the amount of forest cover and negatively affects the habitat quality of forest remnants. Landscape attributes and habitat quality should therefore be evaluated together to improve our understanding of how fauna respond to fragmentation. We evaluated how patch quality (vegetation structure) and landscape characteristics influence the abundance of phytophagous bats in two contrasting types of landscape that differ in percent forest cover and matrix type: landscapes dominated by man-made pastures and landscapes with large tracts of continuous forest (tropical semi-deciduous forest). Bats were sampled in forest patches in both types of matrices, and for each matrix two sites with a cenote (water filled sink-holes, typical of the Yucatan) and two with no cenotes were sampled. Sites with cenotes offer better habitat quality than sites without cenotes: the richness and basal area of plants eaten (flower or fruit) by bats are higher in the forest vegetation surrounding them. At the landscape level, phytophagous bat abundance was negatively correlated with the amount of forest cover and proximity to other forest fragments, but positively correlated with forest edge density, patch density and landscape heterogeneity. At the patch level, bat abundance was positively correlated with plant richness and the basal area of edible tree species. In the Yucatan's agricultural landscapes the area and spatial distribution of forest remnants are not the only variables affecting bats. Habitat patch quality and high heterogeneity of land cover types are also important, and have a positive effect on phytophagous bat abundance and movement.

Predicting the Distribution Pattern of Small Carnivores in Response to Environmental Factors in the Western Ghats

Due to their secretive habits, predicting the pattern of spatial distribution of small carnivores has been typically challenging, yet for conservation management it is essential to understand the association between this group of animals and environmental factors. We applied maximum entropy modeling (MaxEnt) to build distribution models and identify environmental predictors including bioclimatic variables, forest and land cover type, topography, vegetation index and anthropogenic variables for six small carnivore species in Mudumalai Tiger Reserve. Species occurrence records were collated from camera-traps and vehicle transects during the years 2010 and 2011. We used the average training gain from forty model runs for each species to select the best set of predictors. The area under the curve (AUC) of the receiver operating characteristic plot (ROC) ranged from 0.81 to 0.93 for the training data and 0.72 to 0.87 for the test data. In habitat models for F. chaus, P. hermaphroditus, and H. smithii “distance to village” and precipitation of the warmest quarter emerged as some of the most important variables. “Distance to village” and aspect were important for V. indica while “distance to village” and precipitation of the coldest quarter were significant for H. vitticollis. “Distance to village”, precipitation of the warmest quarter and land cover were influential variables in the distribution of H. edwardsii. The map of predicted probabilities of occurrence showed potentially suitable habitats accounting for 46 km2 of the reserve for F. chaus, 62 km2 for V. indica, 30 km2 for P. hermaphroditus, 63 km2 for H. vitticollis, 45 km2 for H. smithii and 28 km2 for H. edwardsii. Habitat heterogeneity driven by the east-west climatic gradient was correlated with the spatial distribution of small carnivores. This study exemplifies the usefulness of modeling small carnivore distribution to prioritize and direct conservation planning for habitat specialists in southern India.

Forage Composition, Productivity, and Utilization in the Eastern Washington Cascade Range

Abstract Provision of forage for wild and domestic ungulates, and the associated impacts of their herbivory, are contentious issues for wildland management in western North America. We quantified the composition, above-ground net production (ANP), and utilization of herbaceous and shrub vegetation in five non-forest and seven forest cover types across the core spring-summer-fall range of the Yakima elk herd in the eastern Washington Cascade Range. We randomly sampled each cover type along three elevational transects during a two-year period. Riparian/meadow was the most productive cover type (2,752 kg ha-1 ANP). High-productivity forest at low to high elevations produced 900-1200 kg ha-1 ANP. High-elevation forest and grassland, shrubland, and shrub-steppe produced 600–700 kg ha-1 ANP. The low-productivity forest cover types and parkland produced 100–400 kg ha-1 ANP. Utilization of forbs, grasses, and shrubs combined averaged 47% of ANP across all cover types, ranging from 26% in high-elevation forest to ...