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Publications

NIBIOs employees contribute to several hundred scientific articles and research reports every year. You can browse or search in our collection which contains references and links to these publications as well as other research and dissemination activities. The collection is continously updated with new and historical material.

2025

Abstract

Clear-cutting can resemble natural disturbances like forest fire, but key differences exist in biological legacy. One way to enhance similarity is by preserving structural features of old-forests, such as retention trees, within harvested areas. The latest Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC) standards require not only the preservation of retention trees but also their mapping for centralized reporting. This study evaluates the accuracy of retention tree density and volume predictions using airborne laser scanning (ALS) data with low (2 pulses/m2) and high (~100 pulses/m2) pulse densities, with and without spectral data. We also assess the feasibility of large-area predictions with minimal field data by testing both in-situ and ex-situ sources. The study was conducted in a managed 1300 ha forest in southeast Norway. Three reference datasets were used: (1) 630 in-situ retention trees across 27 stands (for species and DBH predictions), (2) 1604 ex-situ sample trees (for DBH predictions), and (3) 150 ex-situ annotated segments (for species predictions). Retention trees were identified using an individual tree segmentation approach, using adaptive local maxima window size and applying an adaptative height threshold to filter regeneration. ALS at 2 pulses/m2 alone provided reliable total density and volume predictions, while adding spectral data improved species-specific predictions. Species predictions were relatively stable across data source (kappa=0.556 for in-situ, 0.519 for ex-situ), but DBH predictions were notably underpredicted with ex-situ data (RMSE=9.40 cm, MSD=-4.55 cm) compared to in-situ data (RMSE=8.84 cm, MSD=0.20 cm). Using adaptive segmentation methods enhances scalability. We recommend sampling ~40 in-situ retention trees to develop DBH-height models and delineating ex-situ annotated segments for species predictions. This approach balances accuracy and efficiency while enabling retrospective analysis using national ALS datasets and orthophotos.