Agenda at a Glance

Moderator: Peter Eredics, Forestry Manager, Esri

Creating Value from America's Forest Census
Richard Guldin, PhD, Acting Associate Deputy Chief for Research & Development, United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Forest Service
Richard W. Guldin, Ph.D., CF, RPF is Director of Quantitative Sciences, Research & Development, Forest Service. Since 1996, he has led the Forest Inventory and Analysis program, preparation of national assessments and reports on forest conditions and trends, and coordinated international research collaboration. The FIA program is the nation’s forest census, tracking the health and productivity of all of America’s forests. The FIA program also includes surveys of the management objectives and interests of private forest landowners and of the wood consumption and outputs of the forest products industry. He has also led or been a member of many interagency and international projects aimed at improving the quality of environmental statistics and indicators being reported at regional, national, and global scales. Prior to assuming his current position in 1996, Dr. Guldin served four years as an Assistant Station Director of the Northern Research Station, responsible for all Forest Service research in New England. From 1985 to 1991, he held several senior staff positions in the Research & Development headquarters and for a time was the forestry expert for the U.S Senate Committee on Agricultural, Nutrition, and Forestry. He began his Forest Service research career in 1978 at the Southern Forest Experiment Station in New Orleans, Louisiana, studying southern forest management and forest economics issues. He has a B.S. in Forest Science from Penn State (1970), and a Master of Forest Science and Ph.D. from the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies (1976, 1979). Dr. Guldin is a Registered Professional Forester and Certified Forester.

Moderator: Peter Eredics, Forestry Manager, Esri

Using GIS to Support Decision Making for Texas Forest Managers: Case Study of the Texas A&M Forest Service
Thomas G Boggus, Texas State Forester and Director, Texas A&M Forest Service
The Texas A&M Forest Service has a long history of applying GIS to support forest resource protection and forest resource development. In 2011, the agency embarked on a comprehensive business requirements analysis and development of an enterprise GIS implementation plan. This plan provides the foundation for the integration of GIS across agency program areas.

With the worst fire season in Texas history in 2011, the initial priority was to focus enterprise GIS implementation on meeting wildfire mitigation and prevention planning needs of Texas citizens. The Texas Wildfire Risk Assessment Portal, or TxWRAP, released in April 2012, has achieved this goal, providing stakeholders, administrators, planners and the public, tools to understand local risk conditions and develop plans to reduce their risk. With the success of TxWRAP, TFS has been able to leverage this application platform to extend information and services into fire operations and response, and forest resource development programs. The Texas Forest Information Web Portal was released in October 2012, providing access to timber supply, forest distribution and ecosystem services information to all Texas citizens with a simple click-of-a-button. Enhancements are underway with both applications to facilitate increased demand for information. Other efforts are underway to integrate real-time fire operations with state-of-the-art detection and resource tracking capabilities — all based on enterprise GIS.

This talk will review the challenges, approaches and achievements of the Texas A&M Forest Service in moving to an enterprise GIS implementation. This will include a review of key events and drivers for this investment, as well as accomplishments and benefits that have been realized.

Thomas G. “Tom” Boggus is the Texas state forester and director of Texas A&M Forest Service. A veteran forester, Boggus has worked for the state agency since 1980. He has spent the early years of his career serving the nonindustrial private forest landowners of Texas by providing technical assistance and information – two of the agency’s key functions.

Boggus was appointed to his current position in February 2010 after serving 20 months in an interim role. In the years that followed, he led the agency’s response in two Texas wildfire seasons, including the worst in state history. Boggus has fostered statewide partnerships and collaborations to better protect the people of Texas. He has encouraged and supported TFS employees to develop solutions and deliver information and tools enabling Texans to take care of their land, which protects them from wildfires and other natural disasters.

Boggus leads the nationally prominent state forestry agency by example. His leadership principles include building the capacity of others, passionately believing in making a difference, creating opportunities for success, building lasting partnerships and challenging the status quo by seeking innovative ways to improve.

Boggus received his forestry training at Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, earning both bachelors and master’s degrees in forestry. He is a fellow of the Society of American Foresters and a member of the Texas Forestry Association. He served as president of TFA in 2006 and received The Texas A&M University System Board of Regents Fellow Service Award in 2007 for outstanding service to the citizens of Texas. In 2009 he received the Laurence C. Walker Distinguished Service to Forestry Award from the Texas Society of American Foresters.

Addressing Business Challenges with Changing Geospatial Technology – a TIMO Perspective
Brent Keefer, Vice-President, Hancock Natural Resource Group, and Director of Resource Planning and Investment Strategy, Hancock Timber Resource Group
The timberland investment management organization (“TIMO”) business model presents some unique challenges and opportunities in managing and using geospatial data and technologies. Business challenges include managing numerous individual timberland investment properties, handling transaction flow with ongoing acquisitions and dispositions, and responding to growing demands for more timely and detailed analysis. Organizational challenges involve a geographically distributed and diverse user base, forging effective relationships with traditional IT providers, and maintaining cost effective and scalable systems. This presentation will discuss these challenges from Hancock Timber Resource Group’s experience and how geospatial technologies can help meet the challenges.

Brent Keefer is a Vice-President of Hancock Natural Resource Group, Inc. and the Director of Resource Planning and Investment Strategy at Hancock Timber Resource Group where he is responsible for global resource planning and timberland investment valuation. His role also includes analysis of new investment regions and global timberland investment risk and return. Brent leads timberland acquisition valuation and due diligence and provides oversight for Hancock Forest Management’s resource support teams. Before joining HTRG in 1998, Brent worked for Rayonier Inc. for ten years in the southeast U.S. managing forest resource information and planning systems. He holds a B.S. in forest resource management and a M.S. in forest biometrics, GIS, and remote sensing both from Virginia Tech.

Forests in a Broader Context: The Three Basins Initiative Dr. D. James Baker, Director, Global Carbon Measurement Program, The William J. Clinton Foundation
Since 2007, the world has had high ambitions to face the forestry/climate challenge through international agreements on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation and sustainable forestry (REDD+). But for a variety of reasons, the likelihood of a global, legally binding climate agreement being implemented before 2020 is low. In fact, global efforts on forests have generally slipped into piecemeal activity, and political attention has diminished. At the same time, it has been become clear that data collection through traditional means augmented with satellite remote sensing, sophisticated sampling schemes, and use of multi-scale models in comprehensive GIS systems can provide the information to help decision-makers deal with REDD+ and forest policy. The fact is that policy implementation has lagged technical developments, partly because it has been narrowly focused. Protecting forests without policies to expand agricultural output, secure essential mineral resources, and sustain other vital economic activities could cause unprecedented global food insecurity and far-reaching economic shocks.

To build this broader context, the Three Basins Initiative, representing the countries that contain the vast majority of the world’s tropical forests, has been established to enable the transition to a low deforestation/forest restoration development path. The Initiative is led by former President of Guyana Bharrat Jagdeo and supported by the Government of Norway, the International Union for Conservation of Nature and the William J. Clinton Foundation. It has been exploring the development of large-scale partnerships that can align the need for food, fuel, and sustainable livelihoods with the need for climate and environmental security. It is estimated that a full set of partnerships across the Three Basins could yield a reduction of 50% in annual deforestation by 2020. The new partnerships are based on the successful payment-for-carbon method used by Brazil, Guyana, and Indonesia in their agreements with Norway, which provide clear lessons for earning, managing, and investing payments with adequate benefit sharing and safeguards. GIS has played an important role in all of these countries for decision-making at all levels. The bottom line is that there are challenges, but these need not prohibit additional ambitious action. In this talk I will review the progress that the Three Basins countries are making, the state of financing for forests, and the approaches that are being taken internationally for these large-scale partnerships.

James Baker, Ph.D., is currently the Director of the Global Carbon Measurement Program of the William J. Clinton Foundation, where he works with forestry programs to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and alleviate poverty in developing countries. He is also a Visiting Senior Fellow at the London School of Economics and Political Science and Adjunct Professor at the University of Delaware. He is an expert in the areas of sustainability, climate change, oceanography, and forests with a special focus on the management of complex technical programs. He served for eight years in the Clinton Administration as Under Secretary for Oceans and Atmosphere and Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) where he oversaw weather and climate research and forecasting, coastal zone management, fisheries, and protection of endangered species. Previously he was President of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, Dean of the College of Ocean and Fisheries Sciences at the University of Washington and on the faculty of Harvard University. He has chaired numerous national and international advisory committees and has testified frequently to the U.S. Congress on environmental issues. He is the author of the book Planet Earth: The View From Space (Harvard University Press, 1990).

Monitoring Reporting and Verification System for REDD+ in Guyana
Haimwant Persaud, Assistant Commissioner of Forest and Head of the Forest Resources Information Unit (GIS and Remote Sensing), Guyana Forestry Commission (Guyana)
A comprehensive national system to Monitor, Report and Verify forest carbon emissions resulting from deforestation and forest degradation is the aim of Guyana’s MRVS. The development of Guyana’s MRVS identified and seek to address several key areas. These areas include the establishment of a framework of accepted principles and procedures of estimation and reporting forest carbon emissions and removals at the national level as specified by the IPCC good practice guidelines and the guidelines for reporting at the international level, as well as outlining the REDD implementation Strategy for the MRVS, which entails the assessment of a reference emission level.

In the year 2010 work begun on the implementation focusing on two areas:

• Forest Area Change assessment
• Forest Carbon Monitoring

These activities determined the historical and current patterns of emissions from the forest, their drivers and the carbon stock presented in the various pools.

Haimwant Persaud is an Assistant Commissioner of Forest at the Guyana Forestry commission and also the Head of the Forest Resources Information Unit (GIS/RS) at said Institution. He holds a BSc. In Forest Engineering, an Executive Masters in Project Management, and an MBA in Project management. He’s currently pursuing a Master’s of Science Degree in Geographical Information Systems at the University of Redlands. Over the years much of his work has been in the field of applied GIS and Remote Sensing in the Forestry Sector.

Moderator: Peter Eredics, Forestry Manager, Esri

What’s New in ArcGIS Online
Bernie Szukalski, Product Strategist and Technical Evangelist, Esri

Enterprise GIS for the Bavarian State Forest Administration
Mr. Christian Simbeck, Project Manager, Bavarian Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Forestry (Bayerisches Wald-Informationssystem / BayWIS) (Germany) The Bavarian Forest Information System (German: Bayerisches Wald-Informationssystem (BayWIS)) is used by the Bavarian Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Forestry in Germany. BayWIS is responsible to support all tasks and duties of the Bavarian State Forest administration built on the “GIS as a system” concept. BayWIS has a modular-based structure and can be used with or without actual data-network-link, whether in the forest or in the office, sporting the Esri ArcGIS-Server- and ArcGIS mobile-capabilities. Special attention is paid on menu driven Applications to get quality checked data in a user-friendly way. After intensive testing and operation through the last year, BayWIS has proven itself to be remarkably efficient, user-friendly and stable.

Evaluating Landscape Alternatives with Spatial Adjacency Constraints
Tyler Bax, GIS Analyst, Mason, Bruce & Gerard (MB&G)
Forest land management plans and activities require explicit and detailed spatial information and the ability to generate a range of alternatives using simulation methodologies. When multiple attribute and spatial constraints are present, the complexity of developing and comparing valid alternatives can be quite challenging. In this talk we will present a case study where a framework for landscape sample selection was developed to assist forest managers with developing a land management plan for the redemption of timber cutting rights on timber lands in northwest Oregon. An automated sampling framework was developed using Python, ArcGIS and the statistical package R. This automated iterative process of selecting and scoring sample subsets allowed many simulations to be performed. High scoring subsets were evaluated for spatial adjacency constraints using a recursive adjacency algorithm. Multiple solutions were developed and prioritized. Final products included comprehensive statistical and spatial summaries that were integral for final prioritization and development of a management plan for the landscape.

The Art and the Science of Spatial Optimization
Ugu Feunekes, CTO & Co-Founder, Remsoft (Canada)
Over 95% of Remsoft global clients use ArcGIS. In this interactive session Ugo Feunekes will explore multiple levels of spatial analysis as it relates to your workflow including mathematical model formulation, exclusion, and spatial adjacency, to the spatial relationships of value chain modeling. This live demo, based on audience input, will run, explore, change, adapt and report the optimal results of an integrated forest management plan at all planning levels, and answer questions like:

• How do I make use of spatial information for analysis?
• What spatial information is needed at the various planning levels?
• Am I asking the right questions?
• Is there an easier way?

Ugo Feunekes is one of the most respected and influential people in our industry today. Participants are sure to come away from this session with a better understanding of how to use spatial data to address the complexities, adapt to change, make appropriate changes as circumstances arise, and the ability to understand the consequences of those changes.

Ugo holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Forestry from Lakehead University,Ontario, Canada, a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science and Mathematics from McGill University, Quebec, Canada, and a Master of Science degree in Forestry from the University of New Brunswick, Canada and was named an Edelman Laureate by the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS).

Moderator: Michael Berzinis, Esri Forestry, Esri

Mobile GIS Solutions for Forestry
David Cardella, Product Manager, Esri (Invited)

Field Data Collection with ArcGIS Online Web Maps and the ArcGIS Collector
Timothy E. Clark, Solution Engineer, Forestry Solutions Team, Esri
This presentation will show how to use the ArcGIS Operations Dashboard and the ArcGIS Collector while demonstrating real-time data collection. A web map and collector tool will be created for field workers equipped with smartphones to record location, tree species and plant data around the Esri campus.

Rugged Handhelds – The Next Generation
Mark Milligan, President, F4 Tech
Rick Davis, Vice President, F4 Tech
Last year the Forge was introduced but had not yet been released to the market. Since that time, it has hit the market and is changing the way foresters perform their jobs. The Forge takes data collection and measurements to new "heights" with integrated GPS, distance and, what else, height! – and it's all built-in to a compact, affordable unit. This talk will update attendees on the new device and delve more into how users are making this innovation work for them.

Mark Milligan, President: Mark founded F4 Tech in 1998. He developed and secured a U.S. patent for Real-Time Inventory (RTI). In addition to running the company with the other owners, Mark is heavily engaged in securing and developing business for the Consulting division. Mark has an MBA from Florida State University and a B.S. in Forest Management from Louisiana State University.

Rick Davis, Vice President: Rick joined F4 Tech in 1998. One of his prime responsibilities is the management of the company’s financial systems. In addition, Rick is the lead developer of F4 Tech’s newest business line, F4Devices, which is providing leading edge rugged handheld solutions with a patent-pending process. Rick has a B.S. degree in Forest Resources from the University of Georgia and an M.B.A. from Florida State University.

Deploying Lightweight GIS in Disconnected Environments
Michael Helm, Project Manager, INTEND Geoinformatik (Germany)
WEBLINE MOBILE is a lightweight GIS solution, which can handle geospatial and all other databased data with or without active server connection. The mobile client is based on Esri ArcGIS Mobile SDK and Esri WPF.API and is embedded in a single user interface.

Besides the standard geodata synchronization of ArcGIS Mobile SDK, comes WEBLINE MOBILE with synchronization for all other data from a server database.

A developer can build any extension for special business processes. In summary, WEBLINE MOBILE is a productive and established solution, configurable, extendable, synchronizable and therefore usable in the outdoor area as well as in the office.

No Surprises in the Field, No Mistakes in the Office
Kendis Scharenbroich, Vice-President & COO, Pro-West & Associates
Nobody wants to get in the truck, drive to the field and walk a half a mile to be surprised by what they find. From strategic 100 year plans to tactical 1 year implementation, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology is key to effective Forest Management Certification. The power of GIS spatial analysis and database management ensures that you manage the right amount of forest for certification and receive the return on investment you deserve. It all starts with development of an intelligent certified plan through geographic analysis, then streamlining onsite management, daily operations, monitoring and reporting with easy to use GIS tools.

The core of forest management certification is universal, but the details are specific to your neck of the woods. We will discuss the smart way to get certified by using the right GIS tools to inform harvest prescriptions, operations requirements, monitoring and reporting.

The Gatewing UAV solution for Remote Data Collection in Forestry
Rich Hilliker, Worldwide Sales Manager, Forestry, Technical Sales, Trimble Geospatial Division; Chip Berniard, Sales, Trimble Navigation
Gatewing, a Trimble company, makes the world’s best, most used UAS based rapid terrain mapping tool. By making the technology highly accessible in price and ease of use, Gatewing revolutionizes the surveying and mapping industry.

Gatewing's prime end-to-end solution can also be applied in precision forestry. Gatewing's imagery allows for proper planning of terrain development, in-depth prospecting and visual inspection of plantations and native forests. Moreover, by combining visual and near infrared images, customers get highly accurate information for land management, fertilization management, and targeted harvesting. The Gatewing UAV gathers a tremendous amount of usable data, utilizing the Arc GIS platform for data management and processing throughout the workflow. This lightning talk will contain a case study on NDVI and how the measurements can be used in forest analysis.

Forestry Measurement Tools & Techniques
Derrick Reish, Sr. Product Manager, Professional Measurement Division, Laser Technology
This lightning talk will cover important details everyone should know about laser and compass measurement technology. Using proper tree height techniques, making accurate diameter measurements and determining borderline trees using the BAF factor will also be addressed. The presentation will also cover how measurement tools can integrate with Esri field data collection software.

GPS Accuracy: What Really Works Under the Canopy?
Johnny Thompson, Managing Partner, LandMark Spatial Solutions
GPS accuracy under canopy is one of the most frequently asked questions that we deal with on a routine basis. The convenience of smartphone or tablet-based maps has driven a whole new wave of technology-based applications and questions in the forest. Likewise, GPS chip manufacturers have released a plethora of new receivers in the past few years that have claims of working in bad conditions. As such, LandMark Spatial Solutions routinely tests and analyzes all kinds of GPS antennas in bad canopy environments to sort out the ones that work for our forestry clients from those that don’t.

Johnny Thompson has been using, testing, selling, supporting, and training others in GPS and GIS applications for the past 20 years. His company, LandMark Spatial Solutions, provides GPS, GIS, Forest Inventory and Forest Measurement solutions to over 1000 forestry, wildlife, and environmental companies and agencies throughout the Southeastern US. Johnny also works very closely with F4 Tech, Haglof Inc., Trimble Forestry Automation, Laser Technology Inc., and Esri to provide his clients cutting-edge, technology-based solutions that increase accuracy and improve efficiency in both the field and office.

Field Data Collection and Real-Time Progress Monitoring
Timothy E. Clark, Solution Engineer, Forestry Solutions Team, Esri
During this demo the Operations Dashboard will be used to monitor live data that is being collected in the field. We will show some of the individual data being collected, the collection path that the users are taking and metrics about the actual data they are collecting such as the number of points, user distribution points and more. This will highlight the use of the Operations Dashboard to monitor field teams.

Moderator: Ron Behrendt, Managing Member, Behron

Managing Natural Resources with Lidar at the USDA Forest Service
Brent Mitchell, Lidar Specialist, USDA Forest Service
Within the last decade lidar technology has been increasingly utilized as a tool for resource management by the U.S. Forest Service. The agency has been engaged in a wide variety of lidar projects and applications ranging from the development and exploration of basic lidar derivatives to pursuing advanced modeling of forest inventory parameters based on lidar canopy metrics. This presentation will provide an overview of how Forest Service land management objectives are being addressed through lidar technology and discuss considerations and issues that are unique to applying lidar technology to forest resource management.

Obtained a Bachelor in Forest Science from the University of Georgia in 1998 and Completed a Masters in Remote Sensing at the University of New South Wales, Australia in 2006. Currently acting as a Lidar Specialist and Training Group Leader for the Remote Sensing Evaluation, Applications and Training Program at the Forest Service’s Remote Sensing Applications Center located in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Using LIDAR Data, Imagery and Automated Feature Extraction (AFE) for Forestry Applications
Jonathan Gale, Forestry, Overwatch Systems
With an ever increasing availability of high resolution imagery products, the forestry professional is in a unique position to harness the power of automated feature extraction (AFE) and modeling to rapidly collect valuable information from their data. AFE can be used on many levels, it can be used as a one button solution for extracting tree crown points, to compute stand density and volume, or it can be used to simulate, model and assess complex situations such as wild land fire events. This discussion will explore some of the ways in which AFE and ArcGIS can benefit the forestry community by saving time and automating workflows that create valuable industry standard products.

Jonathan Gale is a GIS and Remote Sensing professional working as a Solution Engineer for Overwatch Systems Ltd in Missoula, Montana.

Practical Lidar Applications for Plantation Forest Management Using ArcGIS
Mark Norris-Rogers, GIS/Remote Sensing Specialist, Mondi (South Africa)
Mondi Ltd, an international forestry, pulp and paper company recently acquired its first lidar data set over a portion of its plantation forest area in South Africa. Due in part to the significant investment required to perform the lidar acquisition, maximum value needed to be extracted to justify the expense and quickly demonstrate to management the value of this form of remote sensing.. As Mondi utilizes ArcGIS as one of its core management information systems, it was opportune to use ArcGIS to process the lidar data to derive products that would aid Forest Managers in their work. After performing some basic QC on the lidar data, procedures and workflows were designed and documented for the creation of bare ground Digital Elevation Models (DEMs); first return Digital Surface Models (DSMs); Canopy Height Models (CHMs) and similar products that would be of value to forest managers. Results from these products improved road and stand delineation, slope class determination; and provided stand tree heights. Results were published using Esri’s new ArcGIS Online services allowing quick and easy dissemination of the information derived. The results from this project demonstrate how quickly and easily useful forest management information can be extracted from lidar data using standard ArcGIS tools and functionality.

Scalable, Esri Integrated Image Processing Solutions for Natural Resources Management
Vasu Pillalamarri, Esri Business Partner Manager, PCI
Imagery is essential to GIS, and a critical component for Natural Resources Management. Esri and PCI Geomatics, supported by MDA and RapidEye, have implemented the Imagery Grant Program that is providing imagery, software, and training to 24 natural resources organizations. An update on the status of the program will be presented – innovative methods and projects will be carried out to harness information and knowledge from imagery through the Imagery Grant Program’s implementation. Best practices will also be highlighted by showcasing projects that have been completed using PCI technology for projects of differing scales.

Connecting the Dots: Lidar and ArcGIS in Action
Kevin Lim, President, Lim Geomatics (Canada)
Nick Gralewicz, GIS Developer, Lim Geomatics (Canada)
This lightning talk will provide a demonstration of AFRIDS, which is a web-based application that was developed using ArcGIS Server and the ArcGIS API for Flex. AFRIDS displays spatially explicit lidar forest inventories and enables users to extract statistics (i.e., a mean estimate with confidence interval) for a suite of forest inventory variables (e.g., DBH, net merchantable volume, aboveground biomass) for planned stands and operational harvest blocks drawn on-the-fly, in addition to the recovery of volume and density by size class (i.e., diameter distributions). New functionality related to routing transportation and water crossing calculations will be showcased.

Comparing Color and Color-Infrared in 4-Band Imagery
David Shear, President, Eagle Digital Imaging
4-band (or 4-channel) images add a near-infrared band to the three standard color bands (red, green, and blue). When displaying a 4-band image you must decide which image band is fed to which of the three display channels. Selecting the three color bands provides a true color view, while selecting the green, red, and near-infrared provides the color-infrared view. ArcGIS enables you to load a 4-band image and set it up as both color and color-infrared, and then flicker between the two. This is extremely valuable for seeing subtle differences when trying to type trees: Differences that are difficult to see in color can sometimes be obvious in color-infrared and vice versa. Although you can see only three bands of an image at once, ArcGIS allows you to take advantage of all the bands of a 4-band image, making it much easier to see the differences among tree types.

Weyerhaeuser’s Grande Prairie Forest Management Area
Vashti Dunham, Operations Forester, Weyerhaeuser (Canada)
Weyerhaeuser’s Grande Prairie Forest Management Area (FMA) covers approximately 1.2 million hectares in northwestern Alberta, Canada. Recent operational forest plans have been based on a photo-interpreted vegetation inventory (completed in 2004), which did not provide the desired level of detail or accuracy for gross volume per hectare or stand height.

Weyerhaeuser was able to access lidar data coverage for the entire FMA (flown between 2003 and 2008), and initiated a project with Lim Geomatics to develop stand models to link the existing network of permanent sample plots (PSP’s) to the lidar data to provide significantly better predictions for gross volume, height and wood size.

The final product was a web-based application running off ArcGIS server which provided a quick and simple way for harvest supervisors to:

• draw in or load a shapefile of their planned blocks,
• view the block along with roads, hydrology, orthophotos and hillshade
• calculate gross merchantable volume, stand height, and wood size distribution
• export data to a shapefile, excel table or pdf report

Preliminary results show volume estimates are generally within the 10% of the scaled volume delivered from the cutblock, and that the lidar-based models underestimate the block volume, particularly in areas with steep slopes or marginally merchantable stands. Further validation of the models will be carried out in April 2013, after the 2012/13 cutblocks have been post-harvest gps’d and the harvested volume has been hauled to the mill. Some of the factors limiting the accuracy of the current models are: tree growth since the lidar was flown, inaccuracy of the geo-referenced center point of some of the PSP’s, and that the lidar was flown over a period of years and in different seasons.

Future steps will include further testing of the current model, and adjustments to account for growth since lidar acquisition, and to improve volume predictions on steep slopes and marginal ground.

Vashti graduated from the University of Alberta in 1999 with a B.Sc. in Forest Business Management. After graduation, she worked for the Alberta Forest Service, primarily in forest health, forest fire operations, industry approvals and community timber programs. In 2005, she started with Weyerhaeuser Grande Prairie, and has worked in silviculture, planning and harvest supervision, roles with a strong component of GIS work and data collection and management.

The Esri and Exelis Lidar Grant Program
Kristen Maglia, Director, Exelis

Lidar for Mapping Shallow Rivers and Riparian Vegetation
Russ Faux, Co-CEO, Watershed Sciences
A new suite of commercial small-footprint, green (532 nm) wavelength airborne LiDAR systems are being developed to enable topo-bathymetric mapping in coastal and riverine environments. These sensors can provide seamless topography across the land-water interface at very high spatial resolution. In addition, the green wavelength LiDAR has potential to improve forest and riparian vegetation analysis when acquired in conjunction with traditional near-infrared (1064 nm) wavelength LiDAR. Watershed Sciences, Inc. (WSI), Corvallis, OR in collaboration with Reigl USA, conducted a study of the Riegl VQ-820-G airborne hydrographic LiDAR for mapping several rivers in the Pacific Northwest. We will provide a brief overview of the results of our tests using this state-of-the-art technology.

Russell Faux is founder and Co-CEO of Watershed Sciences, Inc. (WSI) based in Corvallis, Oregon. Mr. Faux manages a talented technical staff with a focus acquisition, processing, and feature extraction from high resolution airborne LiDAR data and spectral imagery. Mr. Faux serves on the board of the Precision Forestry Cooperative and holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Penn State, and an M.S. in Bioresource Engineering from Oregon State University.

Moderator: Mark Williams, Project Manager, Esri; Tim Clark, Solutions Engineer, Land and Natural Resources Team, Esri

Lessons Learned as the Result of 30 Years of GIS Development
Allen Brackley, Research Forester, PNW Experiment Station, USDA Forest Service
The author took delivery of ArcInfo V1 in June of 1983. At the time, he had degrees in forestry and forest products. Given added effort he had training in computer science (programming and data structures). He also had extensive forestry experience, some gained as a youth working as a woods laborer in a family logging company, as well as 15 years as a supervisory Industrial Forester managing harvesting on 250,000 acres of forest land. Simultaneously, he had secondary responsibly for development of general purpose forest inventory and mensurational systems. The inventory package resulting from this effort is still in use today. This work provided experience with the semi-automated managerial information and accounting systems for wood procurement, land and income taxation, land related information, and exposed him to the concepts of sustainable forestry. Few forestry graduates had exposure to the computer based spatial data and the new product referred to as Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Given his unique background that combined a basic understanding of the information needs of a forestry enterprise and computer science, he accepted the job as Manager of GIS. His vision, however, was not of GIS, but rather a Land Related Information and Management System for a forestry enterprise. Early on he discovered that many forestry firms, some of his employers, employees, and peers wanted to focus on the problems at hand as an exercise in map automation with a limited vision of the future. This presentation will focus on the basic principles, ideas, and actions he applied, many of which are still valid today, to prepare for a future where decisions would be made based on data, as opposed to speculation.

Web Apps to Share Statewide Forest Information
Brad Barber, FRD GIS Coordinator, Texas A&M Forest Service
The Sustainable Forestry Department of Texas A&M Forest Service (TFS) is charged with providing up-to-date information about the forest resources and benefits of those resources to the citizens of Texas. In particular, the agency satisfies numerous requests from forest industry and land developers regarding the distribution, volume and extent of timber resources for potential economic development. Traditionally these requests have been serviced by providing individual custom economic analysis reports developed by TFS staff. Leveraging existing agency technical investments in the Texas Wildfire Risk Assessment Portal, the Forest Resource Development department embarked on the development of a web mapping and reporting web site to satisfy this increasing demand for information about Texas forests. Entitled, the Texas Forest Information Portal, or TxFIP, the site provides landowners, managers, government officials, local community groups and private industry, access to information about trees and forest lands across the state.

TxFIP is comprised of a main web portal site that provides access to custom web mapping applications with capabilities to discover and explore an array of maps depicting forest conditions, including the ability to query and download data and reports on a variety of forest interests. TxFIP provides apps for timber supply analysis, biomass potential, forest distribution and ecosystem services. The portal was designed to facilitate expansion as new demands and apps are developed. TFS works closely with DTS (Fort Collins, CO) to satisfy development requirements for the department based on an agency-wide GIS implementation plan. Future applications are planned for urban tree canopy and Texas Tree Trails, both of which will be geared to people seeking information about trees in urban and residential areas. The majority of the presentation will focus on a live demonstration to share details on the site's architecture, capabilities and information.

ArcGIS Online to Maximize Urban Forest Assessments
Richard Thurau, Principal Geospatial Scientist, Plan-It Geo
Managers often face several challenges when attempting to update and maintain tree inventories given the large number of community groups and individuals involved with tree planting. Desktop GIS applications face many challenges for managing tree inventory data. Namely; (1) Existing inventory points represent a single point in time based on data available at the time of analysis, (2) reference layers for mapping inventory points may be static in both scale and time and must be copied to allow multiple users to share common views, (3) manipulating inventory data in specific areas requires technical GIS know-how, and (4) sharing of assessment results directly with other interested parties requires transferring large files and datasets. ESRI’s ArcGIS online (AGOL) offers an innovative, interactive, and cost effective platform for posting, sharing, and editing geospatial data. UTC assessment and prioritized tree planting results were posted to Plan-It Geo’s AGOL web-mapping service to demonstrate the advantages of sharing across the web. Users were allowed to; (1) Query and edit existing forest inventory trees, (2) add newly planted (or hypothesized) inventory trees using ESRI’s mobile application and AGOL interface and (3) share results with other users. AGOL users were qualitatively surveyed to assess the overall experience of using Plan-It Geo’s customized map templates in the AGOL environment and feedback regarding ease of use and sharing of data results.

Attendees of this presentation will learn some of the flexibility of building custom AGOL templates, how to add data points to an AGOL map using ESRI’s mobile application, and how to edit and query data in the AGOL environment. Recommendations from survey results will be shared with the audience to highlight common pitfalls from experiences using a customized AGOL application.

Stewardship Mapping Made Easy – Get SMART
Chris Gerecke, Director of Enterprise Solutions, Timmons Group
This presentation will focus on the United States Forest Service's Stewardship Mapping and Reporting Tool (SMART) tool. The presentation will cover building an enterprise application to meet the reporting needs of a diverse group of users (in this case – all 50 states and associated territories). It will highlight several mechanisms of reporting including a web application, desktop application (for disconnected use cases), a developer interface for custom application integration (API), and a data upload tool. SMART fills the need for a national Stewardship geospatial data repository that supports consistent and accurate reporting of accomplishments across the landscape. SMART provides a user-friendly, feature-rich Plan creation and management tool for its user base.

GIS as a System at Latvian State Forests
Maris Kuzmins, Title, Latvian State Forests (Latvia)
JSC "Latvian State Forests" is responsible for more than a half of Latvia`s forests (1,6 million ha), and is using a GIS system in each stage of forest management. Our GIS system "GEO" is a perfect example of a centralized GIS solution that consists of ArcGIS Desktop, WEB and Mobile applications. The system is used by 500 users every day, and each user group is provided with the specific set of data and functionality they require for everyday duties. GIS as a system helped our organization to improve speed of data flow, increase data integrity, data quality and accuracy. We have managed to establish a continuous flow of information from the field, up to central database and on to the ERP systems and logistics system. This also gives us an opportunity to monitor and analyze the data in every stage. Creating this system (in particular mobile applications), gave us a chance not to use outsourcing for forest inventory and planning of cutting areas. At the moment we have about 150 feature classes in our database, and only half of them are managed by professional GIS specialists that uses ArcGIS Desktop (mostly for maintaining compartment inventory and associated data sets). The other half is managed by users that use mobile and WEB applications and these two are used by regular foresters who have only finished a simple training. This means that our system must be sophisticated under the hood, in order to be simple to use for everyday user. The System is not only a great example of "GIS as System", but also an example of how a GIS system can be adjusted for a wide range of particular tasks and significant number of non-professional GIS users. We believe we have amassed experience and found solutions that can be useful for other participants of the forest industry.

Real Time Situational Awareness for Wildfires Across the Nation
Clint Cross, Regional Fuels Specialist, USDA Forest Service
With climate change and increasing drought in many areas of the Nation, wildfires continue to increase in frequency and severity. Forestry agencies at the federal, state and local level are all charged with fire protection planning, incident response and suppression and ensuring public safety. However, with fires occurring across multiple jurisdictions and ownerships it is difficult for fire professionals to easily obtain situational awareness about current conditions, active incidents and agency prescribed burns. In response to this demand for up-to-date information about active wildfires, DTS (Fort Collins, CO) has developed a single web site that tracks active wildfires. WildfireMaps.com provides interactive maps and incident information about current wildfires anywhere in the Nation. The site integrates data from a variety of sources providing a single dashboard to keep the public and fire agencies updated on where fires are occurring, and what current status is. WildfireMaps.com provides general information about wildfire locations and status using a simple web mapping application available free to the public. To address more detailed requirements of government agencies and private industry, the site provides a suite of advanced capabilities, including incident alert notifications, fire spread simulation, and automated impact analysis, using a subscription SaaS approach.

The US Forest Service, Southern Region has recently selected WildfireMaps.com as the application to track wildfire incidents across the South. Customization has occurred to regularly harvest data from key government systems and integrate this data into easy to use web and mobile applications. In addition, state agencies are providing their fire data to augment the federal sources.

This presentation will demonstrate WildfireMaps.com focusing on data integration, implementation architecture and plans for future enhancements. A review of future requirement and benefits will be provided.

Moderator: Sinam Al-Khafaji, Team Lead for Land & Natural Resources, Esri; Rebecca Seago-Coyle, Project Manager, Esri

GIS Data Integration and Management
Deborah Sheeler, GIS Supervisor, Davey Resource Group
While Geographic Information Systems provide an array of problem-solving solutions in traditional forestry applications, they also offer great advancements in assessing the health and integrity of urban forestry ecosystems that was once not possible. Spatial patterns of urban forests are closely linked with general zoning/land use categories and are under constant pressure from urban development. Until recently, urban forests were vastly underappreciated in terms of their value because their impacts were difficult to quantify. Due to introduced efforts to preserve and increase urban forests through federal and state grants, the emphasis on these ecosystems has been brought to forefront of today’s environmental concerns.

By using GIS to analyze spatial data, urban forestry managers are able to make more informed decisions about the health of their trees and city as a whole. To solve the problems associated with today’s urban environments, GIS is used to conduct tree inventories and urban tree canopy assessments in additional to focused environmental analyses such as storm water management, forest fragmentation, resource assessments, urban heat islands, and ecosystem benefits. Analysis of current land cover datasets allows for urban planners to set goals and regulations regarding their urban tree canopy. As a case study, the City of Roseville, California is located in the Sacramento Valley in Central California and has a progressive urban forestry program. In 2012, the City initiated development of an Urban Forest Master Plan. The Plan, intended to increase sustainability and the environmental benefits of tree canopy, will guide their urban forest planning and operations over the next 25 years.

A Simple Spatial Approach to Land Records
Tucker Alley, GIS & Land Records Manager, Resource Management Service
In 2006, as a part of the acquisition of more than 4.2 million acres of forestland, Resource Management Service, LLC (RMS) contracted the plotting of each legal description into a GIS data set. This enabled the GIS contractor to identify potential description issues and gave RMS the tools need to review the potential issues and address them with the seller, title company and attorneys.

Upon closing, the data set became the foundation for a centralized digital land records system. RMS currently utilizes the system to maintain land records data on 2.8 million acres of forestland spread over nine states and managed by twelve field offices.

The initial system enabled field foresters and corporate users to access and maintain the digital land records data in a centralized database. Access to the data was provided though a custom ArcEngine application which allowed the users, mostly field foresters to retrieve needed documents spatially. The application provided basic GIS visualization tools, simple map production and the ability to open documents related to a selected property polygon. All users also had the ability to load new documents into the centralized SQL/SDE database through a drag and drop operation. All documents were stored within a BLOB field in the database. This greatly simplified backup and disaster recovery of all the data including the documents as compared to a file based system. Administrators of the data utilized ArcMap to maintain and perform analysis on the data that was beyond the scope of the custom ArcEngine application. A custom ArcMap add-in was written to allow for the loading and opening of documents stored in the database.

RMS recently enhanced the design of the database utilizing the Attachment functionality introduced in ArcMap 10. These enhancements have reduced the need for custom programming and expanded the ability to provide access to the data. RMS still utilizes the custom ArcEngine application for general field user access to the data, but administrators can now access the data through core ArcGIS functionality without the need for a custom add-in. The data can now also be exported using distributed GeoDatabase tools and accessed by anyone with access to ArcMap 10.x. This allows RMS to provide a fully functional export from the database to purchasers of large dispositions. The database schema is also shared with contractors performing due diligence work on acquisitions. All data can be quickly checked into the central GeoDatabase using core Check in/Checkout tools.

By utilizing this relatively simple digital land records system RMS has been able to provide one centralized set of land records data to all stakeholders, reduce storage cost, improve efficiency, reduce risk and increase data security.

Tucker Alley is currently the GIS and Land Records Manager with Resource Management Service, LLC. Tucker is a registered forester with 18 years of experience in industrial forest management, including field operations, GIS project management, harvest scheduling, and systems management and development.

Better Data Management Leads to Better Decision Making
Mark Milligan, President, F4 Tech
St. Joe owns over 560,000 acres in Florida. During challenging economic times, St. Joe needed to find ways to make their forest inventory and planning processes more efficient, thereby allowing for better business decisions. In early 2011, St. Joe managers embarked on a project to improve their forest inventory process, and leverage their Esri GIS database using improved processes and tools such as SilvAssist. The result is that better data is being acquired and utilized, the process from data collection to decision making is streamlined and business decisions are being carried out with more confidence and clarity that before.

Mark Milligan, President: Mark founded F4 Tech in 1998. He developed and secured a U.S. patent for Real-Time Inventory (RTI). In addition to running the company with the other owners, Mark is heavily engaged in securing and developing business for the Consulting division. Mark has an MBA from Florida State University and a B.S. in Forest Management from Louisiana State University.

Manage Image Acquisition to Lower Costs and Level Budgets using ArcGIS
David Shear, President, Eagle Digital Imaging
A common problem when using images for forestry operations is having up-to-date images of your areas of interest at an acceptable cost. Usually, the entire ownership is flown only every 3–5 years to reduce costs, so that by the end of the cycle you are using images that are out of date. By using ArcGIS, it is possible to define only those areas that have changed and therefore need new images. ArcGIS tools can also manage a cyclical coverage of parts of the entire ownership in order to level yearly budgets, instead of incurring a very large cost every few years. These two concepts can be combined to create an efficient and cost-effective method of maintaining your aerial imagery. You will have recent images of all changed areas, and the entire ownership will be covered by images no older than a predetermined number of years. ArcGIS enables this improved approach, as it would be too complex to manually define the required areas to image, describe these areas to a provider, and then manage the delivered images. This presentation will describe how to use ArcGIS tools to create the section layers and associated data (such as stand-planting year and year of most-recent imaging) to implement efficient image management. It will also show how to use ArcGIS to create the shape file of the sections that need to be flown for a particular year or other imaging period. These shape files can then be sent to a vendor to acquire images within the time window you specify. A real-world example of how this has been successfully implemented over a multi-year period will also be presented. Using ArcGIS tools to manage image acquisition provides many advantages. It allows you keep your aerial imagery and associated GIS layers current at a reduced cost, and smooth your yearly image acquisition budgets. And you have surgical control over where and when you get images of each section while ensuring that no section is older than the maximum number of years you specify.

Automated Plat Creation at Weyerhaeuser
Corrin Crawford, Director of IT & Land Records, Weyerhaeuser
Automating the plat and ownership creation process at Weyerhaeuser for a multi-state area has resulted in an enormous ROI benefit of substantially reduced labor costs over manually created and maintained plat maps. Five fewer staff members are now required to maintain the organization's data. The cost of maintaining legal ownership information becomes much more manageable in a digital environment when ownership changes can be automatically mapped, annotated, tracked and documented in an organized manner. In addition, properly structured topological data prevents gaps and overlaps in the GIS data which can be problematic when calculating acreages or producing maps. The goal was to have a system capable of generating plat maps quickly and easily, that would replace the old manual system, and would be easy to update. This goal has been achieved over a project life span of several years and is expandable to cover new areas of interest.

Moderator: Moderator: Ron Behrendt, Managing Member, Behron

Introduction to Lidar and Forestry
Ron Behrendt, Managing Member, Behron
This session will provide a “lidar 101” introduction to the technology including fundamentals of how the sensors operate, data characteristics, the creation of derivative information products from lidar point clouds, and examples of possible forestry applications.

Ron Behrendt is the principal and current managing director of the consulting firm Behron LLC. Over the past eight years, Ron has focused on applying lidar technology to numerous applications such as the management of electric transmission lines and assisting with forest production and conservation activities. Ron is currently assisting Esri identify opportunities to utilize the capabilities of ArcGIS to obtain the maximum value from the information available within lidar data.

For 15 years prior to starting Behron LLC, Ron was one of the founding members and the President and CEO of Positive Systems, Inc., an industry leader in the development and use of digital aerial photography systems.

Multi-Scale Forest Characterization from Airborne Lidar and Imagery
Mischa Hey, Research and Development, Watershed Sciences
High resolution airborne lidar and imagery used in conjunction with field survey plots has potential to increase both efficiency and accuracy of forest inventory over traditional field survey methods alone. Effective application of remote sensing data to forest inventory across large extents requires an understanding of the specific relationships and spatial associations between traditional field-based forestry metrics and metrics derived from airborne lidar and imagery. Watershed Sciences Inc. (WSI) will present methodologies and results from a spatially explicit, multi-scale characterization of two predominantly coniferous forests in OR and ID. Through application of Object-Based-Image-Analysis (Blaschke, 2010) and Random Forest Analysis (Breiman, 2001), metrics derived from airborne lidar and imagery were used to develop predictive models for traditional forestry metrics recorded in the field. Field plots were used for model training and independent validation. Results indicate that significant and useful correlations exist between metrics derived from airborne surveys and those recorded in the field. Models for metrics describing height and volume had the highest predictive accuracies while models describing trunk diameter had the lowest. Specific accuracies for each modeled metric, as well as strengths and weakness of the applied techniques, will be discussed in detail.

Mischa started working for WSI in Corvallis 7 years ago after leaving the Nature Conservancy in SC. His principle interest has been application of remote sensing data to forestry and wildlife habitat modeling. He was introduced to Object-Based-Image-Analysis during his graduate work and has been applying OBIA techniques to vegetation characterization from LiDAR for the last few years. Mischa holds a B.S. Natural Resource Conservation from University of Massachusetts, Amherst and a M.S. Wildlife and Fisheries Biology from University of Vermont- Spatial Analysis Laboratory (SAL).

Operational Forest Inventories with Lidar
Jacob Strunk, Forest Biometrician, AeroMetric
Greg Tilley, VP of Business Development, AeroMetric
The application of lidar in forest management has been the subject of numerous and promising studies. Yet to most forest managers, lidar remains a complex and expensive fringe technology and has not been widely adopted for routine forest inventories. This presentation examines methodologies that allow lidar to be employed cost effectively in concert with traditional field methods. Examples of the application of these methodologies to real commercial forest management operations are reviewed. The findings indicate that a carefully implemented lidar enhanced inventory can be performed at costs that are comparable to a conventional inventory by using statistically-derived reductions in the number of required field plots. Moreover, the lidar solution has the added benefit of high precision mapped estimates of volume, BA and other forest metrics in addition to canopy height and bare earth models. Achievement of optimal results with lidar requires careful balancing of a number of variables, including the number and location of field plots, lidar point density, sampling techniques and the statistical modeling approach. This presentation presents real operational advantages of incorporating lidar into forest inventories, without adding cost or complexity.

Mapping Forest Inventory Parameters Using Lidar
Brent Mitchell, Lidar Specialist, USDA Forest Service
Understanding forest structure and how it is affected by management practices and natural events is a critical part of managing natural resources within the Forest Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture. The Pinaleño Mountains of southeastern Arizona represent a Madrean sky island ecosystem and the last remaining habitat for the Mt. Graham red squirrel. This unique ecosystem is threatened by a general shift in species composition and forest structure as well as by high severity fires and insect infestations. Due to these factors, the Coronado National Forest has implemented a forest restoration effort using lidar (light detection and ranging) as a tool for identifying habitat and cataloging forest inventory variables at a landscape level by building regression models between forest inventory parameters measured on field plots and their associated lidar canopy metrics. The resulting GIS inventory layers were qualitatively validated with local experts and conformed well to trends known to occur on the landscape. This presentation will highlight the appropriate field data collection protocols and data integration techniques when the ultimate goal is combining field and lidar data to create forest structure GIS models.

Brent obtained a Bachelor in Forest Science from the University of Georgia in 1998 and completed a Masters in Remote Sensing at the University of New South Wales, Australia in 2006. Currently acting as a Lidar Specialist and Training Group Leader for the Remote Sensing Evaluation, Applications and Training Program at the Forest Service’s Remote Sensing Applications Center located in Salt Lake City, UT.

Interact with the Experts: Lidar Roundtable
Join this lively discussion with industry experts on all things lidar. Bring your toughest lidar forestry questions and learn from your peers during this interactive session with lidar data providers and users from industry and government.
Ron Behrendt, Managing Member, Behron
Brent Mitchell, Lidar Specialist, USDA Forest Service
Kevin Lim, President, Lim Geomatics
Mischa Hey, Research and Development, Watershed Sciences
Jason Struck, Forest Biometrician and Statistician, AeroMetric

Moderator: Tim Clark, Solutions Engineer, Land and Natural Resources Team, Esri

The Development of Long-term Biomass Harvest Scheduling Scenarios for Alternative Energy Production
Kenneth Stumpf, Director, Resource Management Applications, Geographic Resource Solutions
For many small isolated communities in Alaska biomass is considered a potential alternative source of heating and energy. The determination of the feasibility of changing fossil-fuels based energy production to biomass based energy production must consider the inventory of local biomass, forest growth projections, and the sustainability of long-term plans. In addition, one must consider the constraints upon harvest and transportation of the biomass, environmental regulations, and the costs of procurement. The integration of the different data sets that represent the inventory, harvest units, landscape characteristics, environmental constraints, accessibility, cost, land ownership is a natural application of the GIS. Data may be easily related, processed, reported, and mapped to provide information significant to the determination of a project's feasibility. Data sets can be accessed by growth and harvest scheduling applications to generate modeled results, in terms of biomass, acres harvested, reforestation needs, and associated costs over long-term (100-year) planning periods. Modeled harvest projection scenarios were developed for five different harvest options that represented different management approaches. Modeled results were easily stored in the GIS and represented relative to input constraints and variables to provide visual results of the modeled harvest scenarios.

Optimizing Terrain Transport in Forestry Using GIS
Isabelle Bergkvist, Program Manager, Skogforsk (Sweden)
There is a great challenge in the forestry to minimize damage to soil and water. The key is improved planning through smart applications of GIS Skogforsk has created a decision tool for digital planning of the forestry. In the project we used the Esri product ArcGIS together with a high resolution Digital Terrain Model (DTM) to find the best logging-roads. The DTM is used to extract and built different digital layers, for example elevation, DTW (depth to water map) and degree of slope as well as aspect. In addition we create a layer with "no go areas" where all type of driving should be avoided concerning nature conservation and cultural heritage. The map layers are divided into 4x4 m pixels which get a value 1-5 according to logging conditions. Eventually the optimizing tool in ArcGIS is used to find the best logging-roads concerning both ecological and economic factors.

Geospatial Analysis of Forest Logging Moratorium: Past, Present, and Future
Princewill Odum, University of Calabar (Nigeria)
The Cross River Forest is the largest and remaining rain forest representing about 60% of the entire remaining rain forest in Nigeria. The Government of Cross River State placed a logging moratorium four years ago as a commitment to a reform agenda aimed at effective and sustainable management of forest resources in a way that would be beneficial citizens and the state. Remote sensing and GIS is serving as a veritable tool to spatial analysis of Cross River State Forest. In this paper, image management, classification, and analysis are done to find out the effect of the moratorium on the state of Cross River State forest resources before, during and even after the moratorium. GIS analysis helped to solve the problem of quantifying and reporting the effect of government policy (such as moratorium) with a view to encourage further conservation of forest resources as a means to preventing global warming. Remote sensing and GIS advantage is the rapid representation of analysis which cannot be done by any other means. The image was classified to delineate forest on multi-temporal bases. The output was digitized into a shapefile and necessary overlay was done to visually represent the changes in forest resources over the period. The findings show that before the moratorium, forest resources was depleting at alarming. With the moratorium in place, forest resource is conserved with higher carbon stock and biodiversity conservation. It is projected that the forest resource will improve significantly in stock and quantity if logging is controlled.

Growth Model Development Using Spatial Climatic and Topographic Indices
Moonil Kim, Korea University (Korea)
We developed a radial growth model by considering topographic and climatic factors and used it to predict the spatial distribution of 4 major tree species in South Korea. The model was developed using growth data obtained from 25,352 individual trees at 2,400 National Forest Inventory permanent plots. Because radial growth is attributed to tree age, a radial growth model was first developed using tree age as the explanatory variable. Thereafter, standard growth, defined as the radial growth at a tree age of 30 years, was derived to eliminate tree age effect on radial growth. Further, variogram analysis showed spatial autocorrelation between SG and climatic factors, suggesting that SG could be explained using regional variables, such as climatic factors. We then modeled SG as a generalized additive model using warmth index, precipitation effectiveness index, and topography wetness index.

Using the GAM, we predicted that the future (2047–2056) climate would negatively influence the radial growths of P. densiflora, L. kaempferi, and P. koraiensis and positively influence that of Quercus spp. Further, higher sensitivity to climate factors was observed for radial growth of coniferous trees than that of Quercus spp. Thus, the developed models will aid in understanding the impact of climate factors on tree growth and in predicting the distributional changes of major tree species based on climate change in South Korea.

Land Surface Temperature and Normalized Difference Index Products
Hangnan Yu, Korea University (Korea)
Desertification monitoring as a main portion for studying desertification process have been conducted by many scientists, however, the stage of research still in the comparison of past and current situation. In other words, monitoring need to concern methods how to take precautions against desertification. In this study, an approach is named vegetation temperature condition index (VTCI), which derived from normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and Land surface Temperature (LST) was utilized to observe distribution change of vegetation. The index can be used to monitor drought occurrences at a regional level for a special period of a year, and can be also used to study the spatial distribution of drought within the region. Techniques of remote sensing and geographic information system (GIS) were combined to detect the distribution change of vegetation with VTCI. As a result, we found that the distribution of vegetation in Bulgan, Mongolia could be predicted in a certain degree, using VTCI. Although desertification is a complicated process and many factors could affect the result. However, this study is helpful for provide a strategic guidance to fighting desertification and adjusts the use of the labor force.

GIS-Based Estimation of Climate Change Effects on the National Forests
Arnaldo Ferrerira, Geneticist, USDA Forest Service
According to the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the estimated increase in Mean annual temperatures in California could reach up to 10 o F (5.6 o C) by the end of the century. This increase will lead to an unprecedented climatic condition nonexistent for the last 2 million years in the region. The level of estimated changes in climatic patterns will certainly affect the fitness and natural distribution of the tree species in our forests. This study first describes a GIS-based procedure to estimate the effective planting base for all nineteen National Forests in California. Then it integrates GIS climate models to predict shifts in the natural distribution of tree species that comprises the reforestation efforts of conifers and mixed-conifers forest types in the region. A spline model of climate for the Western United States from the RMRS Moscow Forestry Sciences Laboratory was used to obtain the GIS feature classes for mean annual temperature (MAT) and mean annual precipitation (MAP) used to determine shifts in the planting base. These shifts have been identified for the different Major Forest Types (CalVeg Classes) used for the Forest Service reforestation and conservation guidelines. A better understanding of how climate change would alter the Forest Service’s effective planting area will assist foresters in optimizing resource allocation and introduction of better adapted tree populations to minimize the effects of possible climate changes in the long-term forest health.

Moderator: Michael Berzinis, Esri Forestry, Esri

Offline Mobile Editing for iOS and Android with ArcGIS Online
Matt Sheehan, Principal, WebMapSolutions
The new mobile tablets and smartphones now available offer exciting new possibilities in the field of forestry. Rather than replace traditional mobile solutions, they offer the opportunity to both widen the reach of mobile tools, and simplify workflows. In this presentation we will discuss the use of Apple and Android mobile technology for field work. Leveraging ArcGIS Online we will demonstrate mobile apps which work in both online and offline modes for use in forestry.

Juniper Aspect Field Mapping Solutions
Scott Hunter, Natural Resources Account Manager, Juniper Systems
Juniper Aspect is a robust mobile mapping solution designed specifically for field crew professionals who want to easily collect quality GIS data without the difficulty and overhead of more complex mapping software packages. Designed with flexibility and customization in mind, Juniper Aspect allows users to easily create beautiful mobile GIS projects using terminology that makes sense to field crews. The methods presented will allow GIS experts to analyze and present data instead of spending time training field crews.

GIS & Mobility for Forestry Management
Niva Vilela, CEO, INFLOR
AMATA Company is creating a new way of planning and practicing forestry and logging, prioritizing the forest continuum. Using analytical tools, GIS and Mobility, INFLOR is helping AMATA in the use of technologies and methods to generate positive results in the economic, social and environmental spheres.

Taking your data off the GRID
Austin Mulder, VP Technology, NeoTreks
NeoTreks GRID is a GIS field tool based on the ArcGIS mobile SDK that allows for the sharing of geospatial data between office and field work. Take your proprietary or commercial mapping content off the grid with the tap of a finger. Cache basemaps, tiled or dynamic web services and shapefiles to your mobile device for use in areas of limited or no cellular service. Make field observations, record locations, take measurements and more. Perfect for forestry applications in remote locations.

Team Leaders: Katie Decker, Mark Williams, Rebecca Seago-Coyle, Sinam Al-Khafaji

The Next Generation Handheld – The Forge Echo
Mark Milligan, President, F4 Tech
Rick Davis, Vice President, F4 Tech
Johnny Thompson, Managing Partner, LandMark Spatial Solutions
Each participant will be able to measure distance and height as well as experience the high-performance and accuracy of the Forge Echo. The Forge Echo is the first rugged handheld to provide high-performance GPS, patent-pending ultrasound distance measurement and height calculation all built-in and included in the unit. The various ways how the data syncs with Esri GIS will also be covered.

Mark Milligan, President: Mark founded F4 Tech in 1998. He developed and secured a U.S. patent for Real-Time Inventory (RTI). In addition to running the company with the other owners, Mark is heavily engaged in securing and developing business for the Consulting division. Mark has an MBA from Florida State University and a B.S. in Forest Management from Louisiana State University.

Rick Davis, Vice President: Rick joined F4 Tech in 1998. One of his prime responsibilities is the management of the company’s financial systems. In addition, Rick is the lead developer of F4 Tech’s newest business line, F4Devices, which is providing leading edge rugged handheld solutions with a patent-pending process. Rick has a B.S. degree in Forest Resources from the University of Georgia and an M.B.A. from Florida State University.

John Cothrun, Forest Analyst: John joined F4 Tech in July of 2009. His primary focus includes acting as the Forest Analyst for inventory and GIS projects as well as conducting subcontractor audits and other support services. He has worked for federal, state and private institutions, and has participated in a variety of programs from fire suppression and prevention to timber inventory and management. John’s academic degrees include a Master of Forestry and a Bachelor of Science in Forestry from Northern Arizona University.

Johnny Thompson is the Managing Partner of LandMark Spatial Solutions, LLC, a technology-based company that provides GPS, GIS, and Forest Inventory Solutions to almost 1000 forestry, wildlife, and environmental companies and agencies throughout the Southeastern US. Prior to opening his own company in Sept 2009, Johnny worked seven years for LandMark Systems (now F4 Tech) as their Gulf Region Sales Manager and currently serves as F4 Tech’s Authorized Business Partner for nine states in the South. Johnny holds B.A., B.S., and M.S. degrees from Mississippi State University and is blessed with 12 children whom he and his wife homeschool on a farm outside of Starkville, MS.

Trimble Mobile Field Solutions
Brooks McKee, Product Manager, Trimble Forestry
Rich Hilliker, Sales Manager, Trimble Forestry
Shaun Minton, Sales Manager, Electronic Data Solutions
A complete workflow from the office to the field will be demonstrated using a combination of proven Trimble ruggedized hardware and data collection software enabled with SOLO 360 extension for ArcGIS desktop software. The demonstration will highlight industry-leading GNSS technology under adverse field conditions. Learn to collect, edit, and update Esri spatially enabled data while in the field utilizing SOLO 360 and ruggedized handhelds.

Data Collection with ArcGIS for Android and iOS
Paul Barker, Product Engineer, Mobile Program Team, Esri

Mobilizing GPS/GIS Data with Rugged Tablet PCs for Increased Field Productivity
Jo Lynn Smith, Co-Founder and Sr. Manager, Motion Computing
Tim Clark, Solutions Engineer, Land and Natural Resources Team, Esri

Field Mapping with Juniper Systems Ultra-Rugged Handhelds and Aspect Mobile GIS
Scott Hunter, Natural Resources Sales Account Manager, Juniper Systems
Collect custom points, polygons, and lines using Juniper Systems ultra-rugged handhelds and Juniper Aspect software. Esri partner, Juniper Systems, is a world-leading designer and manufacturer of ultra-rugged field computers ideal for forestry applications. Juniper Systems has leveraged Esri ArcGIS for Windows Mobile technology to create Juniper Aspect software, a powerful tool that enables rapid creation of custom mobile GIS projects.

Scott is the forestry solutions expert for Juniper Systems. He received his bachelors in Wildlands Conservation at BYU and Masters of Natural Resources/MBA at USU.

Laser Offset Data Collection Utilizing ArcGIS for Windows Mobile
Derrick Reish, Sr. Product Manager, Laser Technology
Use current GPS location and apply a laser offset from LTI laser rangefinder for data collection. The rangefinder extension in ArcGIS for Windows Mobile provides a customized geometry collection method for the built-in CollectionFeaturesTask. It allows user to leverage current GPS location, and use rangefinder to shoot target for collecting vertex. The offset information from rangefinder is applied to current GPS location, and hence create corresponding vertex for your target geometry. The extension can be used for collecting point, polyline, or polygon. Also allows user to move while collecting vertices.

Single Tree and Plot Mapping in ArcGIS Online: Digitech Professional & PosTex Laser
Brian Mitchell, Sales Manager, Haglof Inc.
This field station will demonstrate the use of Haglof’s PosTex instrument. It will teach participants how to leverage this technology to go beyond traditional forest inventory methods by capturing detailed spatial information about a plot. It will provide instruction on how this data can be consumed and displayed using Esri products, particularly ArcGIS Online.

Dr. Brian Mitchell is the North American Sales Manager for Haglof, Inc. He’s been a Registered Forester in Mississippi since 1997 and is also nationally certified through the Society of American Foresters. He taught forestry and applications of GIS at the college level for almost 12 years before joining Haglof. He was also a forestry, environmental science and GIS consultant for many years.

Commercial-Grade Tablet Solutions for Disconnected Location Awareness, Data Access and Collection
Tyler Bax, GIS Analyst, Mason, Bruce & Gerard (MB&G)
MBG MobileMap is a mobile GIS solution focused on providing offline access to navigation and location aware information in the field. Built using the ArcGIS Runtime SDK for Android, MBG MobileMap can leverage data from ArcGIS Desktop and ArcGIS Server. This field station will include a demonstration of the MBG MobileMap with cached aerial imagery, vector data, and database information. During the exercise, participates will use the MobileMap to access a wide variety of spatial and tabular information and use the application to navigate to points of interest and query relevant forestry data. The station will be designed to showcase the ability to access spatial information over multiple scales and conduct common forestry-related field actives on a single mobile device.

James Schriever is the Director of Geospatial Services at MB&G and has over 20 years of experience with managing interdisciplinary geospatial teams. Mr. Schriever has considerable knowledge in numerous Esri software products and has served as program manager and principle-in-charge for numerous natural resource geospatial projects that span desktop, enterprise, and web development, as well as image acquisition and analysis.

Tyler Bax is a geospatial analyst at MB&G and has over 10 years of experience working with geospatial technologies and ecological models to inform natural resource management decisions. He specializes in spatial analysis to support forestry, wildfire planning, and watershed management activities. His expertise includes automating geoprocessing workflows and creating custom GIS prioritization tools.

Using Mobile GIS to Perform Real-Time Damage Assessment Caused by Wildfires
Tom Patterson, Wildland Fire Specialist, Esri
This hands-on field exercise will allow the participant to use rugged field devices running ArcGIS for Windows Mobile to collect field data and synchronize with a Server to keep fire officials informed of damaged/destroyed structures during wildfire operations.

GIS Mapping with Lasers, GPS and ArcPad
Joe Cronn, Regional Sales Manager, Laser Technology, Inc. (LTI)
Using LaserGIS for ArcPad, a robust software extension for ArcPad, this station will demonstrate how you can streamline your work flow using LTI lasers rangefinders with a quicker connection, fewer steps that significantly enhances ArcPad®’s current laser offset functionality. Learn the value of GPS laser offsets, collecting height attributes and how easy traverse mapping can really be. LaserGIS is the missing link of truly maximizing your field work productivity. It works seamlessly with ArcPad®'s current platform and complements your workflow by making laser integration faster and easier for you. Mapping with your laser and adding attribute data within your GIS has never been this accessible.

Feature templates are a fundamental component of the ArcGIS editing environment. This workshop will provide an overview of the ArcGIS editing workflows in ArcGIS 10.1. Topics covered will include creating and editing feature geometries and attributes, integrating data from different sources, aligning data, and finding and fixing duplicates and an overview of versioned and web editing. In addition, we will present many tips, tricks, and time-saving techniques to help you use ArcGIS editing tools effectively.

This full day workshop will provide an opportunity for attendees to gain a practical understanding of airborne lidar combined with the capabilities of ArcGIS 10.1 in a forestry applications environment. The day will consist of presentations, live demonstrations, and hands on learning provided by industry and Esri experts, concluding with a deep dive case study titled, “The lidar I order just arrived, NOW WHAT?”. Attendees will learn how to purchase a lidar acquisition, ways to quality control (QC) the data, ArcGIS workflows, lidar data storage and management options, and opportunities to share the information via the web and mobile devices.