Mapping the páramo land cover in the Northern Andes: Figure S4 Expert land-cover classification of the Andean páramo and distribution according to three groups: natural vegetation, natural abiotic and anthropogenic, and 12 classes

The Andean páramo is a biodiverse and vulnerable tropical high-mountain region, whose spatio-ecological patterns remain understudied. The lack of general characterization of its overall extent, land-cover classes, and treeline spatial features hinders our capacity to understand its responses to human impacts and predict future land-system changes. To address this knowledge gap, we classified the land-cover of the páramo in the northern Andes. Moreover, we estimated 1) the páramo’s total extent and distribution among countries, 2) the relative extent of 12 of its main land-cover classes, categorized into natural vegetation, natural abiotic and anthropogenic groups, and 3) the preliminary position and anthropogenic influence of its bordering treeline. Relying on Landsat 8 imagery, we performed hybrid manual-automated classifications using the Maximum Likelihood and Random Forest algorithms. The two resulting final classifications were manually checked for errors compared to Google Earth a...