Data from: Evaluating the use of lidar to discern snag characteristics important for wildlife

Standing dead trees (known as snags) are historically difficult to map and model using airborne laser scanning (ALS), or lidar. Specific snag characteristics are important for wildlife; for instance, a larger snag with a broken top can serve as a nesting platform for raptors. The objective of this study was to evaluate whether characteristics such as top intactness could be inferred from discrete-return ALS data. We collected structural information for 198 snags in closed-canopy conifer forest plots in Idaho. We selected 13 lidar metrics within 5 m diameter point clouds to serve as predictor variables in random forest (RF) models to classify snags into four groups by size (small [<40 cm diameter] or large [≥40 cm diameter]) and intactness (intact or broken top) across multiple iterations. We conducted these models first with all snags combined, and then ran the same models with only small or large snags. Overall accuracies were highest in RF models with large snags only (77%), but kappa statistics for all models were low (0.29–0.49). ALS data alone were not sufficient to identify top intactness for large snags; future studies combining ALS data with other remotely sensed data to improve classification of snag characteristics important for wildlife is encouraged.

搜集汇总

背景与挑战

背景概述

该数据集旨在评估激光雷达（ALS）在识别对野生动物重要的枯立木特征（如大小和顶部完整性）方面的应用。研究基于爱达荷州封闭冠层针叶林中198棵枯立木的实地数据，使用13个激光雷达指标和随机森林模型进行分类，但发现仅ALS数据不足以准确推断大型枯立木的顶部完整性，建议未来结合其他遥感技术。数据集包含多个文件，记录了样地信息、地形数据和枯立木特征，适用于森林生态学和遥感研究。