Estimating Forest Areas and Volumes For Large Tracts

Publisher： Society of American Foresters

ISSN： 0022-1201

Source： Journal of Forestry, Vol.48, Iss.8, 1950-08, pp. : 340-342

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Abstract

Whenever estimates of forest areas and volumes are required for small tracts it is difficult to find a substitute for the conventional 5, 10, or 20 percent timber cruise; but when an area the size of a county or even a township is involved, these intensive cruises are quite often out of the question. This article describes a method for large tracts that has been used in the Pacific Northwest by the Forest Survey of the U. S. Forest Service, other public agencies, and a few private agencies. No one solution to the problem of providing area and volume estimates for large tracts may be universally applicable. Each project probably will have a unique set of requirements, and the available facilities for the estimating procedures are likely to vary from region to region and from job to job. There is, in addition, the matter of personal preference. All methods will require some assumptions and the relative advantage of sets of assumptions peculiar to different methods is usually a subject for speculation and argument but not for proof. Still, the method currently used in the Pacific Northwest yields some results that may be useful in other regions.