Presettlement tree distributions and forest types of northeast Ohio, USA, mapped with species distribution models

European colonization radically transformed the landscapes of eastern North America. Understanding this legacy is vital to managing current ecological communities. To do so requires spatially explicit information about presettlement vegetation. Here we test the ability of species distribution models, which have rarely been used with historical data like land survey records, to generate useful predictions of presettlement tree distributions. These models also allow us to assess pre-disturbance vegetation-environment relationships.
Location: Cuyahoga County, Ohio, USA
Methods: Generalized linear models, generalized boosting models, random forests, and maximum entropy models related the distributions of 17 tree taxa to elevation, slope, aspect, and soil type, based on 4234 tree observations from circa-1800 surveys. Cluster analysis defined forest types and created a prediction map of forest types using random forests.
Results: This study generated high-resolution predictions of presettleme..., We analyzed historical survey data on 17 individual tree species and 10 forest types using species distribution models to create prediction maps of pre-settlement distributions. , , # Presettlement tree distributions and forest types of northeast Ohio, USA, mapped with species distribution models

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.wwpzgmsv8](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.wwpzgmsv8)

## Description of the data and file structure

The accompanying code and data was used to generate distribution models and prediction maps for analyses described in Flinn et al. Raster versions of the maps included in the paper are included here. 
### Files and variables

#### File: Flinn\_et\_al.\_JVS\_forest\_type.txt

**Description:** Data file for forest type analysis described in Flinn et al. 

##### Variables

* Unique_ID: unique identifier for survey lines 
* POINT_X: Longitude coordinate (WGS84)
* POINT_Y: Latitude coordinate (WGS84)
* Group10: forest type code, with values assigned as follows: 1 = Quercus-Castanea, 2 = Fraxinus, 3 = Fraxinus-Acer-Tilia, 7 = Fagus-Acer, 70 = Acer, 75 = Quercus-Carya, 91 = Fraxinus-Ulmus, 92 = Quercus, 384 = Fagus, 390 = Tsuga, Picea, or Pinus

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