Skip to Main Content
U.S. Forest Service
Caring for the land and serving people

United States Department of Agriculture

Home > Search > Publication Information

  1. Assessing insect-induced tree mortality across large areas with high-resolution aerial photography in a multistage sample

    Share via EmailShare on FacebookShare on LinkedInShare on Twitter
    Dislike this pubLike this pub
    Author(s): Randy Hamilton; Kevin Megown; James Ellenwood; Henry Lachowski; Paul Maus
    Date: 2010
    Source: In: Pye, John M.; Rauscher, H. Michael; Sands, Yasmeen; Lee, Danny C.; Beatty, Jerome S., tech. eds. Advances in threat assessment and their application to forest and rangeland management. Gen. Tech. Rep. PNW-GTR-802. Portland, OR: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Pacific Northwest and Southern Research Stations: 571-580
    Publication Series: General Technical Report (GTR)
    Station: Pacific Northwest Research Station
    PDF: Download Publication  (675.0 KB)
    Note: This article is part of a larger document. View the larger document

    Description

    In recent years, unprecedented tree mortality has occurred throughout the national forests owing to insect infestations and disease outbreaks. The magnitude and extent of mortality, coupled with the lack of routine monitoring in some areas, has made it difficult to assess the damage, associated ecological impact, and fire hazard in a timely and cost-effective manner. To aid forest managers in assessing the damage, a cost-effective multistage sampling method, using high-resolution digital aerial photography, was developed to estimate overall mortality across large areas. The method was tested within a 332,000-acre piñon/juniper woodland west of Flagstaff, Arizona, within the Kaibab National Forest. Piñon pine mortality caused by piñon ips bark beetles (Ips confusus (LeConte)) was assessed from high-resolution digital aerial imagery within percent-cover strata with the use of a digital dot grid. The sample revealed that dead trees covered 7.0 ± 0.3 percent of the study area. As a percentage of total tree cover, 20.0 ± 0.8-percent mortality had occurred. The cost to obtain this estimate was approximately $0.04 per acre.

    Publication Notes

    • Visit PNW's Publication Request Page to request a hard copy of this publication.
    • We recommend that you also print this page and attach it to the printout of the article, to retain the full citation information.
    • This article was written and prepared by U.S. Government employees on official time, and is therefore in the public domain.

    Citation

    Hamilton, Randy; Megown, Kevin; Ellenwood, James; Lachowski, Henry; Maus, Paul. 2010. Assessing insect-induced tree mortality across large areas with high-resolution aerial photography in a multistage sample. In: Pye, John M.; Rauscher, H. Michael; Sands, Yasmeen; Lee, Danny C.; Beatty, Jerome S., tech. eds. Advances in threat assessment and their application to forest and rangeland management. Gen. Tech. Rep. PNW-GTR-802. Portland, OR: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Pacific Northwest and Southern Research Stations: 571-580.

    Keywords

    Dot grid, imagery, Ips confusus, pinyon, remote sensing, sample.

    Related Search

    XML: View XML
Show More
Show Fewer
Jump to Top of Page
https://www.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/pubs/37104