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Track: Forestry
Dr Joseph Berry
Innovative GIS Solutions, Inc
2000 S College Ave Ste 300
Fort Collins, CO 80525
Telephone: 303-490-2300
Fax: 970-490-2300
E-mail: ba_sis@fortneg.org
David J Buckley, Richard M Teck, Kevin McGarigal
Seamlessly Linking ArcInfo to Forest Growth and Landscape Analysis Models
Forest growth models have been used for many years to simulate changes in the forest landscape over time. Recently developed landscape analysis programs characterize the shape, pattern and fragmentation of vegetation elements spatially depicted as individual patches, classes of individual patches, and entire landscape sets. Communication between the programs, however, has been left to end users and requires considerable programming knowledge of the disparate systems' syntax, file types/formats, custom conversion programs, and operating system procedures. The intimidating and confusing "mechanics" of the linkage has severely limited the effective use of landscape analysis in natural resource management. This paper describes an operational forest management system that links the U.S. Forest Service's Forest Vegetation Simulator (FVS), Stand Visualization System (SVS), and FRAGSTATS Spatial Pattern/Structure programs within the ArcInfo geographic information system. The "seamless link" provides a
user-friendly graphical menu consisting of scroll lists, toggles and buttons to facilitate program specifications and automatically generate appropriate tables, charts, and maps for enhanced interpretation of the results. The integrated environment generates rapid map displays and comparisons of projected forest growth and changes in landscape patterns. The intuitive graphical user interface allows users to concentrate on simulation results and management implications rather than on the mechanics of the analytical procedures.
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