Evaluating the Robustness of Plot Databases in Species-Specific Light Detection and Ranging-Based Forest Inventory

Virpi Junttila and Tuomo Kauranne

Abstract: In recent years, airborne laser scanning (also known as light detection and ranging [LiDAR]), in combination with digital aerial photography has been used to estimate plot-level forest characteristics of new sites. Forest characteristics are defined both as parameters derived without regard to species, total stand parameters, and species-specific stand parameters. The use of LiDAR has produced promising results, but its costs have been high, because the numbers of sample plots needed for model development and calibration are relatively high. Recently, the use of databases of sample plots from other formerly measured sites in the estimation of new site total stand parameters has been tested. Only a small number of sample plots were needed for acceptable results. In this study, the use of databases is extended to species-specific forest stand parameter estimation with LiDAR histograms and digital aerial photography. The data processing includes LiDAR histogram calibration and statistically tuned plot selection from the databases. The samples of the calibration set and databases are weighted to avoid bias in the estimates. Data from seven different sites are used for cross-validation of the given method. The estimates of species-specific parameters are quite accurate, although their accuracies fall short of those attained for total forest parameters. The use of plot databases reduces the variance in estimation error. FOR. SCI. 58(4):311325. Keywords: LiDAR-based forest inventory, sample plot database, species-specific estimates

N COMPARTMENT-BASED FOREST INVENTORY, the forest characteristics of given areas are extracted from the field measurements and given, e.g., as species-specific stem diameter distributions. The forest stand parameters that are used for management purposes include height of trees, number of stems, basal area at breast height of tree, and volume of stems. The forest stand parameters based on statistical values can be divided into total forest stand parameters, which describe the forest characteristics without regard to tree species (e.g., total volume of stems located in a plot), and species-specific forest stand parameters, which define the species-specific value of the parameter (e.g., volume of spruce stems located in the plot). Light detection and ranging (LiDAR)-based forest stand parameter estimation at the compartment level has been shown to produce good results, especially in the case of total forest stand parameters. These estimates have been derived using different mathematical approaches, such as ordinary least-squares regression with step-wise variable selection (see Nsset 1997, 2002, Means et al. 2000, Nsset et al. 2004, Holmgren 2004, and Rooker Jensen et al. 2006), k neighbor methods (k-nearest neighbors or k-most similar neighbors) with step-wise variable selection (Maltamo et al. 2006), and Bayesian regression with automatic variable selection (Junttila et al. 2008). The methods use sample plot LiDAR data and field measurement-based forest stand parameters as the training set of the model. The forest stand

parameters of target plots are then estimated using the model thus obtained, with target plot LiDAR data as the input. In recent analyses, species-specific forest stand parameters have also been estimated in test sites (Packalen and Maltamo 2006, 2007). To obtain accurate estimates, a large number of sample plots is needed. Because LiDAR data do not correlate strongly with species-specific forest stand parameters, features derived from digital aerial photographs are also added to the model. The accuracy of species-specific estimates varies greatly, depending on the quality of the site, the set of LiDAR variables, and the features derived from digital aerial photographs. In general, species-specific estimates are much less accurate than total estimates that are aggregate estimates of all species. The fundamental reason for this is that LiDAR measures first and foremost the height of trees. Because dominant trees in a homogeneous boreal forest often have a relatively similar height/diameter ratio across different tree species, this signal is represented in LiDAR histograms very prominently. Species-specific differences only show up in less statistically significant features of the LiDAR histogram and in the color information of aerial images. Since 2008, operational forest inventory in Finland has adopted a LiDAR-based approach. Several commercial

Manuscript received April 1, 2010; accepted April 22, 2011; published online February 2, 2012; http://dx.doi.org/10.5849/forsci.10-034. Virpi Junttila, Lappeenranta University of Technology, Department of Mathematics and Physics, P.O. Box 20, Lappeenranta, 53851, FinlandPhone: 358503316465; Fax: 358-5-621-2898; virpi.junttila@lut.fi. Tuomo Kauranne, Lappeenranta University of Technology, Department of Mathematics and Physicstuomo. kauranne@lut.fi. Acknowledgments: We thank Matti Maltamo and Petteri Packalen from the University of East Finland and Vesa Leppanen, Hanna Parviainen, Jussi Peuhkurinen, and Martin Gunia from Arbonaut, Ltd., for providing data and features used in this study. We also thank our three anonymous reviewers for many constructive suggestions that have considerably improved the presentation. Copyright 2012 by the Society of American Foresters.

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companies and research institutes have provided these services to the state-funded regional forest centers that are charged with forest inventory on private forestlands. Different providers use different estimation methods, such as k-nearest neighbors, k-most similar neighbors, and the sparse Bayesian regression used in the current article. In some tests, regional forest centers have had several vendors conduct inventories in the same area. In one such test, three vendors calculated both total and species-specific estimates in the same area in Central Finland. As an example of the quality of the estimation results produced by the different methods in use, the relative root mean square error (RMSE) per sample plot in the total timber volume varied between 21.6 and 24.4% among the three vendors, whereas the RMSE in the volume of the dominant tree species varied between 41.9 and 49.1% and was generally twice as high for the minority species (Heikkila 2010). Therefore, the inferior quality of species-specific estimates appears to be a generic phenomenon associated with LiDAR and not related to a particular estimation method. A significant amount of sample plots is needed as training data for the models and especially for estimates of species-specific forest stand parameters. However, in operational use, the number of field measurements should be as small as possible to keep the cost of LiDAR-based forest inventory attractive. In Junttila et al. (2008), the accuracy of the estimates of a set of total forest stand parameters was verified by varying the number of field sample plots. With a representative set of sample plots from the site, the estimates were found to remain good even with models defined with only 50 70 sample plots. Maltamo et al. (2009) continued the work by validating different sampling strategies for field sample plot selection. They showed that LiDAR histogram-based sample plot selection generally provides the most accurate results, especially for plot-level total volume estimates and that a plot sample size of approximately 50 is enough to produce reasonably accurate results. Another approach to reduce the required number of sample plots is to attach data from different, previously measured sites to the data from a new site to improve estimation accuracy. The effect of using two different sets of sample plots obtained from different forests has been studied by Nsset et al. (2005) and Suvanto and Maltamo (2010). In the analysis of Nsset et al. (2005), the direct mixing of sample plots from the two sites had a mostly negligible effect on the quality of estimates for all three different estimation methods that were tested. In their study, only total forest parameters were estimated. A relatively large number of training set plots were native plots, i.e., plots located on the target site whose forest stand parameters were predicted, because there were only two sites. When many plot databases are used together, it is likely that the majority of plots will be alien, i.e., not from the target site. This may introduce bias into the estimates. Suvanto and Maltamo (2010) predicted six new target area forest stand parameters by using one database. They used LiDAR height histograms and a different number of randomly chosen target area (new site) sample plots (10 212 plots) combined with 472 database plots. No calibration of LiDAR histograms and no plot selection based 312
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on new site forest stand parameter distribution were used. They verified the results using cases in which only the new site sample plots were used in the training set of the model. When the plot number was at least 50 120, the best results were obtained by using the mixed model with only randomly selected new site training set plots. This result confirms the results produced earlier (Junttila et al. 2008; Maltamo et al. 2009). For smaller sample plot set sizes, the use of a database improved the RMSE%. However, Bias% was a problem with every database-based model, varying along with the weight the database was given in the model. This problem probably came from the differences in the forest stand parameter distributions in the two separate areas. In addition, the difference in the LiDAR scanning equipment may have had some influence on the results. In our previous article (Junttila et al. 2010), we used a novel correction technique to infer relationships between LiDAR and forest stand parameters. This technique used the sample plots from the new site to recalibrate previously calibrated databases over different spatial areas. Our methodology reduced the number of sample plots needed from the new site substantially. We evaluated the quality of these estimates using only a small number of calibration plots measured in the new site (between 20 and 70), which were complemented by the full set of measured plots from the three other databases that were available. LiDAR scanning and measured total forest stand parameters were used. We computed estimates by combining suitable plots from plot databases with calibration plots at the new site. These were compared with estimates that used only calibration plots. When all the databases were used together, it was shown that the combined estimates were consistently better, or at least as good, as those produced with just the calibration plots. However, several technical issues were left unresolved. The most important of these was the accuracy of speciesspecific estimation. In this article, the use of databases is assessed for species-specific forest stand parameter estimation. Another important issue we discuss is the effect that databases of different sizes have on estimates. If the number of plots used from the database is larger than the number of plots used from the target site, i.e., calibration plots, then the database plots dominate in the model. This can be thought of as sampling in clusters, in which each cluster may possess a different number of samples, an issue that needs to be properly accounted for in the estimation method. In addition, the possible bias due to differences in forest stand parameter distributions of sites of different qualities needs to be addressed in more detail. With a few additions, the general methodology we use in this article is similar to the one we used in our previous article. The question of bias and the proper weighting of data originating from different types of sites are discussed and implemented in some detail. Resulting estimates were tested using cross-validation of multiple test sites. This validation is performed together with the validation of species-specific forest stand parameter estimates derived using databases.

Study Sites and Biometric Data

In this article, seven separate test sites, s, in different parts of Finland were used either as a new site to be estimated or as databases. The sites sj, j 1, , 7 in order are located at Matalansalo (Heinavesi), Juuka, Loppi Janakkala, Pello, Lieksa, Kuhmo, and Karttula (Figure 1). The sample plots on the study sites were measured with a number of different sampling strategies. Some sites were equipped with a regular sample plot grid, some others were equipped with regularly sampled plot clusters, and still others were equipped with randomly selected plots. These differences were ignored in the estimation process, because they are likely to vary in operational use as well. Sample plots were always circular plots with a 9-m radius. They were positioned at first with a handheld global positioning systems (GPS), and the exact position of the plot center was later calculated during measurement and differentially corrected offline. This method generally ensured a position error of less than 1 m, which has been deemed adequate to align LiDAR data and field plots so that their areas overlap to a degree exceeding 90%. LiDAR data were clipped to plot extent before LiDAR parameters were extracted. In this article, there were 20 forest stand parameters, based on field measurements. They were derived in a similar manner at each site, using models of Veltheim (1987). The forest stand parameters consist of the total parameters median tree diameter (Dgm), median tree height (Hgm), stem number (N), basal area (G), and volume (V), supple-

mented with corresponding species-specific parameters Dgm1, Dgm2, Dgm3, Hgm1, Hgm2, Hgm3, N1, N2, N3, G1, G2, G3, V1, V2, and V3. Here the indices 13 refer to these species: 1 for Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris), 2 for Norway spruce (Picea abies), and 3 for hardwoods treated as a group, but mostly comprising birch (Betula verrucosa). The forest stand parameters of the measured Nsj plots of each site sj were stored in an Nsj 20 matrix Ysj (ysj1, ysj2, , ysj20) in the same order. The parameters can also be divided into four subsets: total forest stand parameters of site sj were stored in Ytot, sj (ysj1, ysj2, , ysj5), species 1 specific parameters in Ysp1,sj (ysj6, ysj9, , ysj18), species 2 specific parameters in Ysp2, sj (ysj7, ysj10, , ysj19), and species 3 specific parameters in Ysp3, sj (ysj9,y sj11, , ysj20). The pairwise correlation scatterograms of the total forest stand parameters of plots of these test sites are shown in Figure 2. The characteristics of the sites are also shown in Table 1. At least 400 plots have been measured in the field on each site. It can be seen from these measurements that the test sites are not similar. The shapes of forest stand parameter distributions vary and the mean values of parameters differ between the sites. For instance, total forest stand parameter distributions for Matalansalo, Juuka, LoppiJanakkala, Lieksa, and Karttula are quite similar. In addition, the distributions of Pello and Kuhmo resemble each other. However, when taking the species-specific parameters into consideration, there are differences: see, e.g., Figure 3 for the scatterplot of spruce parameters. The seven areas were chosen from a wide geographical range of forest types to test the robustness of the plot database approach. There are some areas that have similar forest characteristics, which can therefore be expected to support one another. One area, Pello, is of a type that is totally different from the other six areas. It was included to verify that inappropriate plots would not harm the accuracy of the estimates and that the estimation process would automatically discount the potential harmful impact of such plots.

Remote Sensing Data

The test data for the test sites consist also of LiDAR measurements from the area. To achieve better species-specific estimates, features derived from digital aerial photographs were also used where possible. In one site, Matalansalo, digital aerial photographs were not available.

LiDAR Data
LiDAR scanning of the different areas was conducted from 2004 until 2008. Three different types of scanners were used, namely the Optech ALTM 3600, the Leica ALS50, and the Leica ALS60. Flying height varied between 700 and 2,000 m, and scanner pulse frequency varied between 58,900 and 125,100 Hz. The set of candidate variables derived from LiDAR measurements for each sample plot used in estimation of each forest stand variable is similar to the set that we used in our previous article (Junttila et al. 2010). It consists of percentile points and cumulative percentile parts of the first
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Figure 1.

Location of the test sites.

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Figure 2. Pairwise correlation plots between some stand parameters for different test sites. The scale in each figure in a column is equal. Table 1. Mean characteristics of the test sites. Matalansalo Annual heat sum (degree days) Mean volume (m3/ha) Mean timber height (m) Mean basal area Mean no. of stems Maximum timber height (m) Scots pine (vol %) Norway spruce (vol %) Hardwoods (vol %) No. of measured plots 1150 203.4 17.0 24.7 1,506.9 30.6 53.2 34.5 12.3 472 Juuka 1000 145.5 14.7 20.3 1,284.6 25.2 67.2 21.7 11.0 511 Loppi 1250 203.2 17.4 22.9 1,109.0 33.7 45.3 41.5 13.2 441 Pello 850 102.8 11.7 17.8 1,325.2 20.9 38.6 34.1 27.3 553 Lieksa 1050 194.8 15.9 23.1 1,185.3 30.6 61.1 24.1 14.8 483 Kuhmo 900 195.3 15.7 25.1 1,003.8 23.7 64.8 24.0 11.2 470 Karttula 1100 205.9 17.7 24.0 1,150.7 35.5 29.1 45.0 25.9 538

and last pulse heights of nonground hits (height 2 m), percentile intensities of first and last pulse intensities of nonground hits, mean of first pulse heights 5 m, SD of first pulse height, and the number of measurements 2 m of first and last pulse heights divided by the total number of the same measurements of each plot. These 38 candidate variables for each plot of site sj were stored in the Nsj 38 matrix Xsj, LiDAR. 314
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Digital Imagery
To improve the accuracy of estimates of species-specific forest stand parameters, digital aerial photography was also used in this study. The digital aerial photographs that were taken have pixel sizes of 0.5 m and three or four channels. Digital ortho-rectified aerial images were used with 0.5-m spatial resolution. The channels used for visually assessing

Figure 3. Pairwise correlation plots of species 2 (spruce) forest stand parameter values for different sites. The scale in each figure in a column is equal.

tree species were in most cases blue, green, red, and nearinfrared. No direct feature extraction was performed on them, but they were visually interpreted instead. Depending on the site, the number of pixels per tree crown varied greatly, but there were typically 1,000 pixels per sample plot and some 50 100 per dominant tree crown. Two features drawn from the aerial photographs were available in all test sites except one, Matalansalo. Such databases with incompatible information content are very likely to occur in real-life forest inventory. Features derived from digital aerial photographs were added to the candidate variables of the estimation models. These features are the percentage of all pixels of the aerial picture of a plot that are classified as hardwood (Hwd) and the percentage of pixels that are classified as conifer trees (Cnf). The classification was performed subjectively by a human interpreter. The feature values are between 0 and 100% and they follow the rule Hwd Cnf hits to ground 100%; that is, all the pixels of the aerial picture of the plot were classified to one of the three classes. For

each site sj, these two features were stored in an Nsj 2 matrix Xsj, aerial. The histograms of the distributions of Hwd and Cnf in sites Juuka, Loppi-Janakkala, Pello, Lieksa, Kuhmo, and Karttula are shown in Figure 4. The subjective classification of pixel shares introduces a subjective element to the method. Different sites have been classified by different individuals, and by incorporating such classifications, we also analyze the impact of such subjective estimates in the context of using plot databases for species-specific estimates, as they add another layer of nonhomogeneity between sample plots and potentially become a source of bias. Because no additional information about the quality of subjective classification was available, the features of digital aerial photographs were nevertheless assumed to be classified in a uniform manner for each site. Thus, no calibration was applied to the database aerial photograph features, when they were used to estimate new site characteristics. Both the LiDAR variables and the aerial photo-derived
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Figure 4.

Histograms of distribution of plot-wise Hwd and Cnf of each site.

features were used as candidate variables in total and species-specific forest stand parameter estimation. Thus, the candidate variables matrix of site sj is an Nsj 40 matrix Xsj (Xsj, LiDAR, Xsj, aerial).

phasis of this article is not on finding the best possible method for species-specific estimates, but on verifying the effects of the use of databases, the straightforward sparse Bayesian method was deemed adequate.

Species-Specific Regression Estimates

In this article, the emphasis is on the verification of the precision of the species-specific forest stand parameter estimates. The total and species-specific forest stand parameters were estimated with the sparse linear Bayesian regression (Tipping 2001), which automatically selects the variables used for estimation from the set of candidate variables. Possible negative estimate values that occur, especially in the case of species-specific forest stand parameters, were set to 0. The estimates of total forest stand parameters, stem number, basal area, and volume were used to calibrate the corresponding species-specific stand parameter estimates, because the total values are sums of corresponding speciesspecific values. For instance, the total volume estimate y5 and the sum of species-specific volume estimates y5, s y18 y19 y20 must be equal. To maintain this equality, the species-specific volume estimates (which are generally estimated with less precision than the total estimates) were multiplied with y5/y5, s. In cases in which all the estimates of species-specific parameters of a plot were zero, the total estimate was also set to zero. In the case of zero total value estimates combined with nonzero species-specific estimates, the total value estimate was set to the sum of species-specific estimates. For estimation of responses from variable-response data containing many zeros and clear clusters (zero and nonzero values), better results could be obtained by also using classification and clustering, as well as using different formulations of the variables. In this study, the available data did not contain information that could be used to classify zero and nonzero values of different species-specific responses. Thus, only the regression approach was used to estimate the forest stand parameter values. In addition, because the em316
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Statistical Theory and Methodology

In our previous work, three databases were used to estimate the new site total forest stand parameters (see Junttila et al. 2010). In the procedure we introduced, only a small set of sample plots (between three and nine stands, including approximately 20 70 plots, total), called the calibration set, was measured in the new site to gain information about the LiDAR measurement properties and the forest stand parameter distributions of the new site. The estimation of forest stand parameters was performed using the calibration set and the three databases that were available. The databases were processed to fit the new site calibration data in two ways. First, the LiDAR histograms of each database were calibrated to avoid differences due to potentially different measurement equipment and flight altitudes using Ncal calibration plots and their most similar pairs from each database. The calibration was performed with separate linear calibration coefficients for each measured feature in the LiDAR histograms: first pulse height, last pulse height, first pulse intensity, and last pulse intensity. Automatic gain control in some scanners makes intensity difficult to calibrate reliably. This should be taken into account in variable selection. The sparse Bayesian method used in the current article performs variable selection automatically. The difference in percentile values of aboveground (height 2 m) hits of these features between the calibration set and each database was minimized using the calibration coefficient. In a second stage, a set of Ndj database plots from each database dj were selected. The goal of this step was to improve the accuracy of model calibration by increasing the size of the teaching set. To avoid bias due to different forest stand parameter distributions in the new site and in the

databases, only plots that fit the calibration set total forest stand parameter distribution were selected. In this article, we widen these steps to include estimation of species-specific forest stand parameters. In addition to being used for the estimation of new site parameters, the characteristics of species-specific forest stand parameters were used in database processing within two steps of the procedure: in the most similar pair selection and in plot selection. There were also more databases available in this article. In total, there were seven measured sites, six of which also contained information from digital aerial photographs of each plot. With an increasing number of database plots available, more attention needs to be paid to the weight of databases in the estimation of forest stand parameters. Database data may be biased compared with data from the new site, and it should not be trusted more than the calibration set, which represents a sample of the true data.

forest stand variable distribution needs to cover the new site characteristics as well as possible. In this study, 85% percentile points of first pulse height and intensity were used as the criteria for accepting the calibration set. The SD of these variables among the selected calibration set plots was required to be at least 90% of their deviation in the full set of the new site LiDAR histogram. The intensity of LiDAR measurements was used in this study as a calibration set selection criterion, because it is known to correlate with species-specific forest stand parameters and thus improve coverage of those species-specific parameters in the new site calibration set (Korpela et al. 2010).

Pair Selection and LiDAR Histogram Calibration

In the calibration step, the most similar neighbor of each of the calibration plots was selected from each database. The neighbors were selected according to the weighted sum of distances between the calibration set plot and database plots in terms of both total and species-specific forest stand parameters. As in the procedure with total parameters only, the weight of a forest stand parameter in the summation depends on the expected precision of the LiDAR estimates of each parameterthe more precise the LiDAR estimate, the more weight it gets in the pair selection. For instance, Hgm, which is estimated very precisely with LiDAR, is weighted more than stem number, a value for which the estimates are less precise. Species-specific forest stand parameters are weighted less, because they generally correlate only slightly with LiDAR measurements. If there is no significant correlation, their weight in pair selection will be negligible. After the acceptable pairs are selected, the calibration

Overview of the Processing Technique

The estimation procedure was performed similarly to the one introduced in Junttila et al. (2010), with some modifications discussed here. The procedure is shown as a stepby-step overview in Figure 5. Steps that are modified in this article are shown with an asterisk.

Calibration Set Selection

As in our former study, the calibration set for the crossvalidation procedure was chosen randomly from the new site. The LiDAR histograms were used as the selection criteria, thus providing the only information about the new site at this first stage of the procedure. The range of the

Figure 5.

Step-by-step overview of the algorithm.

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itself was performed in a manner similar to that of the calibration of total forest stand parameters. The differences in percentile points of ordered cumulative sums of each type of histogram measurement between the pairs were minimized using a linear coefficient for the database measurements. Only the LiDAR measurements with height 2 m were used to define the percentile points, as they are assumed to describe the trees of the plot. Because all the plots used in this study were from mature forests, there were enough first pulse measurements to fulfill this condition. However, the variables drawn from the last pulse LiDAR measurements have to be used with special caution. For some plots, there may be only a few, if any, measurements with last pulse heights 2 m. In such cases, there was not enough nonground data for height and intensity variables. These plots could not be used for LiDAR calibration, because there were no pairs for the last pulse height and intensity calibration procedures. In the estimation of forest stand parameters, the missing variables of last pulse data, i.e., plots that contain zero or only a few LiDAR last pulse measurements with height 2 m, are a problem. In this study, the database plots containing zero last pulse nonground measurements were left out from the training set. If the new site itself contained plots with missing last pulse data 2 m, the variables containing last pulse data were also left out. In such cases, there were only 27 candidate variables.

characteristics of the calibration set plots in terms of mean Mahalanobis distance. The mean Mahalanobis distance, Mah(x, xm,C, p) trace (x xm)C 1(x xm)T /p, (3)

is used to define the distance of the (1 p) vector x from the center of distribution xm with (p p) covariance C. In this case, p 5, because the five different parameters used in the plot selection were as follows: Dgm, Hgm, N, G, and V. The heuristic selection rule in the case of total forest stand parameters was (Junttila et al. 2010) exp( mt,i) exp( Mah(Yttot, d i, yt c, Ct c,5)/2) tot, tot,
j

ri

(4)

t where Ytot, d ji is the vector of transformed total forest stand parameters of plot i of database j, yt c and Ct c are the tot, tot, mean and covariance of the transformed calibration set total forest stand parameters, and ri is a random number, ri [0, 1]. The plots containing total forest stand parameter characteristics close to the calibration set distribution center are more likely to be selected than those that are far from it. In the case of species-specific estimation, for each species spr, r 1, 2, 3, the nonzero values (i.e., plots containing trees of the species spr) of the transformed calibration set parameters were used to define the mean and covariance t t of the distribution: yspr, c and Cspr, c. The mean Mahalanobis distances of plot i for the three different sets spr of speciesspecific parameters r 1, 2, 3 were set to

m spr,i

t t Mah Ytsp ,d i, ysp ,c, Csp ,c, 5 /2, if Ytsp ,d i

r j r r r j

0,

(5)

Plot Selection
The species-specific forest stand parameter measurements were used in the modified plot selection step of the procedure. Heuristic selection in accordance with the multinormal distribution was used, as in the plot selection step with total forest stand parameters. The distribution of nonzero values of all the forest stand parameters was transformed so that it is as close to a multinormal distribution as possible. In this study, the transformed matrix Yt of forest stand parameters consisted of yt k yt k yk , for k 2, 9, 10, 11 (1) (2)

and otherwise to zero. In this case, the heuristic selection of plot i was based on the maximum mean Mahalanobis distance of all of the four different types of forest stand parameters: exp max mt,i , msp1,i , msp2,i , msp3,i ri . (6)

yk , for k

1, 3, . . . , 8, 12, . . . , 20.

That is, the species-specific value of the parameter was transformed with the same transformation as the total value of the same forest stand parameter, with all other parameters except Hgm being transformed by taking the square root of their value. The transformed distributions are not exactly multinormal, and different sites may have different shapes of distribution. This means that the shape of the scatterogram between many pairs of forest stand parameters varies considerably from site to site. Thus, it is still an open question whether there exists a better approach for plot selection. However, the results achieved with this approach are acceptable (the chosen plots are within the range of the calibration set distribution) and robust against changes in distributions, as is seen below in our experimental results. The range of the acceptable plots was defined by the 318
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Thus, for each species, only the plots that fit within the multinormal space of the nonzero values of the calibration set parameters of the species were included in the model. However, the amount of zero and nonzero values of each species also defines site quality. Because the regressionbased estimation approach of forest stand parameters does not classify the zero and nonzero values (e.g., whether an individual plot contains spruce or not), the ratio of zero versus nonzero values in the training set affects the model. If there are too many zero values compared with nonzero values, it is likely that the estimates will be biased toward too small trees. Thus, it is important that the quality of the selected database distribution is also handled in terms of species ratios. In this study, there were seven classes of plots. The classes consist of all the possible combinations of the three species (where at least one species is always present in the plot): species {(1, 0, 0), (0, 1, 0), (0, 0, 1), (1, 1, 0), (1, 0, 1), (0, 1, 1), (1, 1, 1)}, (7)

where 1 refers to a species present on the plot and 0 refers to a species not present. For example, plots containing pine

and hardwood, but no spruce, belong to the class 5, species (5) (1, 0, 1). Each plot belongs to just one of these classes. For the new database dj consisting of Ndj selected plots, the number of plots belonging to each class cl 1, , 7 is Ndj, cl. The ratio of plots belonging to class cl from the plots of the new database is dj, cl Ndj, cl/Ndj. It is also known that in the Nc calibration plots, there were Nc, cl plots belonging to class cl, producing the ratio c, cl Nc,cl/Ndj. Reselection among the selected plots was performed according to the species class ratios. If the ratio of the calibration set c for a certain class is smaller than that for the new database dj, then the number of database plots containing that class must be decreased and vice versa. Thus, for each plot i in the database dj, the ratio of the class ratios is defined by ci
c,cli d j ,cli

calibration data, special attention needs to be paid to the selection procedure of the calibration plots. The databases are to be noninformative extensions to the calibration set, reinforcing the information in the calibration set, but not giving new information about the new site itself. Thus, if the calibration set range does not cover the range of new site forest stand parameters, then neither will the databases. The calibration set size, Nc, may be small compared with the size of the selected plots of each database dj, Ndj, and when all the J new databases available are used, its relative size becomes even smaller. However, because the database(s) contain only alien plots, one should never rely more on them than on the calibration set.

Bias
The aim in the use of databases is to achieve a smaller RMSE in the new site verification set than when only the calibration set is used, while the bias is kept close to zero for the forest stand parameters. For the estimates, the most reliable data of the response variables, i.e., forest stand parameters, are provided by the calibration set, which is assumed to be unbiased and true. The mean of the calibration set response may be assumed to be the mean of the estimated responses of the new site, which is derived either by using only the calibration set, or by using both the calibration set and the databases. To achieve estimates with a response mean equal to the calibration set mean, the input in the sparse Bayesian regression was normalized with the following calibration set characteristics: yk 3 yk ykc
kc

(8)

where cli is the class to which plot i belongs. If class cli is overrepresented in the new database, ci 1; if it is underrepresented, ci 1. Defining the selection probability pi [0, 1], the heuristic selection is performed by the rule pi ci max c ri , (9)

where ri is a random number ri [0, 1]. The plots with classes that have the largest ratio between the class ratio in the calibration set and the class ratio in the new database have a selection probability of 1. This means that these classes are strongly represented in the calibration set but weakly represented in the new database. Plots with a class that is not represented in the calibration set but that is well represented in the new database have a selection probability close to 0. They will thus probably be discarded. The reselected plots of the database j are labeled with dj.

, k,

(10)

Estimation Calculation Using Multiple Databases

If the forest stand parameter distributions on the new site differ from the selected database distributions, a bias may occur when using databases. This may be expected to happen whenever an alien site, i.e., a database, is used in the estimation of another site. The database forest stand parameter distribution may contain plots that are out of the range of the new site distribution or the mean and covariance of the database stand parameters may be different from those of the new site. These conditions resemble the case in which plot sampling on the new site does not include the collection of a representative set of all relevant forest types, but in which some types of the forest are over- or underrepresented in field measurements. The selected plots of the databases were considered to be samples from the new site. The only true data are the calibration data from the new site itself, data that are expected to contain an unbiased distribution of the forest stand parameters that represent the full range of forest types on the site. To achieve such

where yk is the vector of forest stand parameter k, ykc is the calibration set mean, and kc is the calibration set SD of forest stand parameter k. In addition, candidate variables were normalized with respect to their calibration set characteristics. The regression itself was then performed without a constant term, i.e., the regression line goes through the calibration set mean with a slope defined by the calibration set combined with the databases. For clarity, the index k is left out from the rest of the equations in this article. Each of the regression models discussed here is assumed to be a model of an individual forest stand parameter, independent of the other forest stand parameters.

Probability Sampling
The basic idea of probability sampling is introduced in the book Model Assisted Survey Sampling (Sarndal et al. 1992). The selection of the plots used in the regression of new site forest parameter estimates can be thought of as survey sampling from a frame population UF consisting of the population of all the J databases D D1 D2 DJ and the population of the new site Sn, UF D Sn. The target population U is part of the frame population, U UF, and it contains the part of the frame population that fits the new site population statistics. The aim of this study
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was to estimate the forest stand parameters Yv on the plots v, v U, belonging to the verification set v of the target population, from which only the candidate variables, Xv, are observed. The measured samples from the new site, the calibration plots c, c Sn, are assumed to contain the full dataset of independent variables and responses, (Xc, Yc), from the new site. The samples from the databases, d D, contain the dataset (Xd, Yd). The sample selection of the target population was performed using the information from the calibration plots: the plot selection of each database was performed heuristically using the forest stand parameter distributions of the calibration plots as measurement statistics. These selected plots d, d D together with the calibration set form the sample s d c of the target population, s U. The databases often contain plots from forest types that are not present in the new site. Such plots can contaminate statistical models with inappropriate sample information. This problem is termed over-coverage. To avoid over-coverage in the model calibration step, plots that do not fit to the plot distribution of the new site are simply left out from the training set. Another and more serious problem is under-coverage. There may be plot types in the new site that are not included in the frame of databases and in the calibration set because there is only a limited number of databases available, and these contain only certain types of forests. Under-coverage may lead to errors in the estimates, because the observations of those forest types are missing or are represented only in the calibration set samples. The problem of under-coverage is likely to diminish as the number of available databases increases and the database coverage of different forest types is improved. The errors in observations due to different sources of data, i.e., the differences due to LiDAR measurement equipment and flying altitudes during measurement, were assumed to be negligible after the LiDAR measurement calibration process in this study. The measurement and processing errors were also assumed to be negligible. The use of the selected databases can be thought of as cluster sampling from the target population, with each database and the one calibration set being an individual cluster. The size of each cluster may be different, and the total size of the J 1 clusters in the target is N Nc Nd1 dj Nc Nd. These clusters were then used in the regression to maintain the estimates of the verification samples in the target population. There is some ambiguity in the interpretation between weighted regression and inclusion probability, when sampling is combined with model-based estimation (see Pfeffermann 1993). For the current study, we have consistently used the term inclusion probability, because the tests carried out here also involve sampling the calibration set from a more comprehensive frame population, and such terminology allows for a unified presentation of the sampling process. In operational application, the role of the calibration set is to define a prior distribution that is used as a weight in sampling plots from the databases. In this case, all calibration plots are assigned an inclusion probability of one, and the relation between the calibration 320
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set and the databases resembles weighted regression, with weighted inverse inclusion probability as the regression weight. The elements i, i 1, , N of the target population may each have a different probability i of inclusion in the sample. In this study, the calibration set samples are drawn from the total target population of size N, and thus the probability that the sample i from the calibration set c is selected is i Nc/N, i c. The probability that the c sample i from the database d is selected is i d . Thus, the inclusion probability is smaller for Nd /N, i d the cluster with a sample size that is smaller than that for the other clusters, and the samples of the cluster are underrepresented in the population. This approach is suitable whenever the number of calibration plots is small compared with the total number of plots selected. Hansen and Hurwitz (1943) and Horvitz and Thompson (1952) have applied the principle of expansion to an estimate of the total population. In the estimation of variables of the total population, the ith element in the population, when present in the sample, will represent i 1 population elements. For regression, expansion is included in the matrix multiplication. In ordinary regression, the estimates for each forest stand parameter at hand are based on the linear equation y Xw , (11)

where y is the target vector, i.e., the forest stand parameter, X is the matrix containing candidate variables used in the estimation, w is the linear regression weight vector, which is assumed to be sparse, and is the error vector with zero mean and variation 2. The ordinary regression estimate for the weight is w (XTX) 1XTy. In the Bayesian formulation of regression, the likelihood of the data plot i is normally distributed as p yi w,
2

N yi Xi w, 2

1/ 2

exp

1 y 2 2 i

Xi w

(12)

and the total likelihood of the sample s consisting of the Nc samples from the calibration set c together with the collection of the Nd samples d from the available databases is p ys w,
2

,
i s

N yi Xi w,

N ys Xs w, 2 IN .

(13)

Using likelihoods in this form, samples of the calibration set have proportion Nc/N of the cumulative effect in the model training. If Nd is large compared with Nc, databases dominate the model training procedure. Any differences in the forest stand parameter distribution density or the shape of databases compared with the new site may lead to biased estimates. If the estimator is included, in the spirit of Sarndal et al. (1992, Chapter 5.10), the variance of the estimate error of the sample i is now 2 i. Thus, the variance has spatial variation, and 2IN is replaced with 2 s, where N diagonal matrix with diagonal elements s is an N corresponding to i s. The ordinary regression i

estimate for the weight of the variance would be, as in Sarndal et al., w
T Xs 1 s

Xs

T Xs

1 s

ys .

(14) esti(15)

In Bayesian formulation, the total likelihood of the mated training set plots is N(ys Xsw,
2 s

).

In other words, the error variance is allowed to be larger for the samples that are measured from the clusters with large sample size. For clusters with low inclusion probability, only small residuals are allowed. With this approach, the total representativeness of both the calibration set and the database is equal in the estimation procedure. This new variance matrix can easily be included in the sparse Bayesian regression procedure. In practice, the measurements (Xs, Ys) in the likelihood are replaced with 1/2 estimators, (Xs, Ys) (Xs, Ys), in the sparse Bayess ian regression method. In this method, because of the prior distribution of the weights, the number of selected variables depends on the size of the data compared with the precision of the estimate, not on the scale of the data. Thus, the weighting in this form affects only the mutual weighting of the different sources of data, as in ordinary weighted regression. More details of the sparse Bayesian regression method are found in Tipping (2001) and details of its application to forest stand parameter estimation are found in Junttila et al. (2008).

at the plot level; that is, the calibration set was gathered using individual plots of heterogeneous forest types as discussed in this article. Estimates for each forest stand parameter were derived with measurements of the calibration set from the new site only, and the calibration set was complemented by the databases. The optimal estimates for each verification set were the estimates derived using the leave-one-plot-out procedure in the full set of plots of the new site, and these estimates were used as the benchmark against which the use of databases was tested. The error of each forest stand parameter estimate was verified using the rest of the measured plots from the new site as verification plots. This procedure was repeated 50 times for each site to verify the robustness of the use of databases.

Results
The results of the precision of total and species-specific forest stand parameter estimates for the new site Matalansalo are shown in Table 2, for the new site Lieksa in Table 3 and Figure 6, for Pello in Table 4, and for LoppiJanakkala in Table 5. In the tables, the medians of RMSE% of the repetitions, together with their maximum values, are shown for estimates derived with the calibration set only, with the calibration set together with selected plots from all the databases, and with the full, dense set of measured plots in the new site, i.e., the optimal results. For each site in the cross-validation procedure, the trend in results is similar. The RMSE% of each of the 50 repetitions varies considerably using only the 50 plots of the calibration set. The quality of forest stand parameter estimates depends on the quality of the calibration set, meaning how well it represents the characteristics of the new site. The range of calibration set results is thus large, even though the median of RMSE% is tolerable. However, when
Table 2. Median and maximum of RMSE% estimation results in Matalansalo in 50 repeated calibration plot selections using databases. Median RMSE% (maximum) c Dgm Hgm N G V Dgm1 Dgm2 Dgm3 Hgm1 Hgm2 Hgm3 N1 N2 N3 G1 G2 G3 V1 V2 V3 17.1 (25.2) 10.5 (14.2) 33.0 (46.8) 19.7 (27.4) 24.6 (35.6) 75.0 (99.2) 40.6 (60.5) 80.0 (101.5) 66.7 (91.1) 38.7 (48.9) 67.6 (91.1) 73.5 (91.8) 67.6 (92.2) 110.8 (145.3) 55.7 (68.6) 69.4 (83.3) 131.5 (181.0) 63.9 (76.7) 80.0 (108.0) 153.9 (238.9) c all databases 15.0 (16.8) 9.5 (10.5) 29.4 (34.0) 17.8 (19.8) 21.6 (24.2) 67.0 (73.8) 39.0 (50.1) 76.5 (86.0) 59.1 (65.8) 36.9 (44.8) 63.8 (68.0) 68.3 (75.8) 64.0 (71.0) 105.2 (118.8) 50.8 (58.0) 64.8 (70.6) 120.1 (133.1) 59.2 (67.8) 75.0 (86.9) 141.8 (162.6) Optimal 13.9 (14.2) 8.8 (9.1) 27.9 (28.5) 16.3 (16.7) 20.5 (20.9) 62.8 (65.6) 34.4 (35.4) 72.2 (74.6) 55.7 (58.2) 33.8 (34.9) 60.8 (62.6) 64.0 (65.9) 58.2 (60.2) 92.8 (97.3) 47.0 (48.5) 57.8 (59.8) 111.9 (116.7) 53.5 (55.6) 67.3 (70.2) 134.1 (140.4)

Process of Validation
In this study, data from seven different sites were available. The modified procedure that uses database information in the estimation of forest parameters in a new site was tested using cross-validation. One site at a time was used as the new site, and the others were used as databases. In the case of Matalansalo as the new site, only the LiDAR variables were used; otherwise, both LiDAR variables and features of digital aerial photographs were used as the candidate variables for the weighted sparse Bayesian model. For each site, a repetition procedure was performed with 50 calibration plots that were randomly selected from the new site using given selection criteria. In former studies concerning total forest stand parameters (Junttila et al. 2008, 2010, Maltamo et al. 2009, Suvanto and Maltamo 2010), this amount of sample plots selected with sufficient criteria from the site has been shown to be enough to produce tolerable estimates. However, the stability of the estimates deteriorated significantly when only 50 sample plots were used, and thus the reliability of the results was not good enough for operational use. In this study, this amount is assumed to be large enough to get reasonable results, but still small enough to show the performance of the given method. In our previous article, the Matalansalo calibration set was gathered in stand-level field measurements, with the stands assumed to be homogeneous and consisting of a small number of plots. However, for the species-specific parameter estimates, better coverage of the forest types of the area was needed, and thus Matalansalo was also handled

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Table 3. Median and maximum of RMSE% estimation results in Lieksa in 50 repeated calibration plot selections using databases. Median RMSE% (maximum) c Dgm Hgm N G V Dgm1 Dgm2 Dgm3 Hgm1 Hgm2 Hgm3 N1 N2 N3 G1 G2 G3 V1 V2 V3 16.1 (23.6) 10.6 (14.0) 35.8 (45.7) 26.9 (37.3) 32.9 (46.4) 56.8 (75.5) 61.5 (77.0) 81.2 (124.9) 52.6 (69.3) 54.9 (66.2) 61.5 (96.7) 63.0 (72.3) 95.9 (120.9) 104.3 (139.0) 60.0 (78.9) 110.9 (158.2) 112.8 (160.6) 75.9 (107.7) 126.3 (226.5) 128.0 (258.6) c all databases 14.2 (16.3) 9.5 (11.0) 33.3 (37.7) 23.5 (26.7) 28.3 (33.7) 49.4 (65.2) 55.9 (66.0) 72.9 (87.3) 46.0 (58.2) 50.1 (59.1) 55.1 (61.4) 59.1 (67.2) 93.1 (104.0) 93.8 (104.0) 56.1 (75.8) 104.5 (134.9) 99.1 (116.8) 69.8 (97.5) 120.5 (167.7) 115.2 (136.0) Optimal 13.2 (13.6) 9.1 (9.3) 31.2 (32.2) 21.5 (22.2) 26.6 (27.7) 43.7 (45.2) 51.5 (53.3) 68.5 (70.1) 39.8 (41.4) 46.3 (48.1) 52.5 (54.1) 53.0 (54.8) 80.6 (83.8) 88.8 (92.8) 49.9 (51.6) 85.7 (90.5) 90.8 (95.0) 62.7 (64.9) 101.7 (108.1) 106.0 (110.8)

Table 5. Median and maximum of RMSE% estimation results in Loppi-Janakkala. Median RMSE% (maximum) c Dgm Hgm N G V Dgm1 Dgm2 Dgm3 Hgm1 Hgm2 Hgm3 N1 N2 N3 G1 G2 G3 V1 V2 V3 16.1 (20.20) 12.4 (17.30) 42.3 (55.30) 25.4 (32.70) 30.4 (39.20) 85.4 (110.10) 50.3 (61.20) 94.4 (149.80) 83.1 (141.40) 48.3 (61.40) 81.8 (114.10) 107.8 (125.00) 78.1 (87.80) 119.2 (174.80) 87.1 (109.60) 75.5 (96.80) 115.7 (141.80) 100.7 (124.80) 85.3 (129.30) 137.5 (180.30) c all databases 15.0 (17.30) 11.8 (13.40) 41.8 (45.90) 24.1 (27.50) 28.1 (31.60) 82.0 (95.80) 50.1 (56.00) 91.9 (101.10) 79.4 (93.70) 47.6 (55.10) 81.1 (90.90) 98.5 (110.70) 76.8 (85.00) 111.6 (141.90) 84.0 (95.30) 76.2 (85.70) 108.7 (126.60) 96.6 (112.30) 86.4 (101.50) 126.6 (159.50) Optimal 14.0 (14.40) 11.1 (11.40) 38.4 (40.00) 22.5 (23.10) 25.8 (26.50) 74.2 (77.30) 43.3 (45.50) 88.0 (90.20) 70.7 (73.80) 40.9 (42.80) 77.0 (79.20) 94.3 (98.50) 69.0 (73.00) 105.2 (111.60) 74.9 (78.80) 64.7 (67.30) 103.7 (109.40) 85.2 (89.80) 74.5 (78.50) 121.0 (127.30)

Table 4. Median and maximum of RMSE% estimation results in Pello. Median RMSE% (maximum) c Dgm Hgm N G V Dgm1 Dgm2 Dgm3 Hgm1 Hgm2 Hgm3 N1 N2 N3 G1 G2 G3 V1 V2 V3 18.4 (26.9) 11.7 (15.4) 64.2 (96.4) 31.3 (46.6) 32.8 (46.0) 82.7 (134.0) 67.0 (83.9) 72.0 (90.0) 79.0 (124.8) 65.0 (87.9) 63.3 (79.5) 127.8 (153.4) 112.1 (148.9) 112.5 (163.4) 96.6 (134.4) 90.8 (113.3) 76.5 (93.0) 102.4 (135.9) 98.5 (125.3) 81.1 (97.9) c all databases 17.1 (18.2) 10.9 (12.3) 58.7 (69.2) 28.2 (32.4) 28.4 (32.9) 77.7 (82.9) 62.9 (77.5) 66.8 (74.3) 74.1 (79.9) 60.2 (76.8) 59.1 (70.3) 119.8 (138.7) 104.6 (116.8) 105.4 (114.5) 90.1 (99.3) 84.4 (98.3) 69.6 (81.9) 94.3 (107.1) 93.0 (111.5) 71.6 (80.5) Optimal 15.9 (16.2) 9.9 (10.2) 55.1 (56.5) 24.7 (25.2) 25.5 (26.3) 72.1 (73.8) 55.2 (57.4) 61.8 (63.0) 68.5 (70.0) 52.4 (54.5) 54.4 (55.4) 112.5 (115.1) 95.2 (99.5) 100.1 (104.0) 84.0 (86.8) 77.2 (81.0) 67.0 (70.0) 88.3 (92.1) 87.7 (91.5) 69.5 (72.6)

the plots selected from the five databases are included, the results generally become more stable. The medians of the RMSE% for forest stand parameters are smaller or remain the same in 97% of the tested forest stand parameters (20 parameters in seven test sites), which are closer to those of the optimal RMSE%. The maxima of RMSE% of the 50 repetitions are significantly smaller for the estimates derived with databases. The optimal RMSE% derived with the leave-one-plot-out procedure using the dense set of plots on the new site remains best in each case. For all the sites in the cross-validation, average Bias% of the 50 repetitions remained close to zero, depending on the calibration set bias. 322
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Given the absence of digital aerial photographs of the area, the estimates in Matalansalo were derived using only the LiDAR histograms. The results for the total forest stand parameters were similar to those in our former article (Table 2). Thus, the modification of the procedure did not harm the estimation accuracy. Even though six databases (Juuka, Loppi-Janakkala, Pello, Lieksa, Kuhmo, and Karttula) were used, the bias remained insignificant. For all the forest stand parameters, the RMSE% results became consistently better when all the databases were used, in addition to the calibration set information. In the case of Lieksa as the new site, other sites excepting Matalansalo were used as databases (Juuka, LoppiJanakkala, Pello, Kuhmo, and Karttula), which allowed the use of digital aerial photographs as candidate variables in the sparse Bayesian regression, in addition to LiDAR histograms. The precision of the estimates was consistently better when all databases, in addition to the calibration set information, were used (Table 3). The median, and especially the maximum, of the RMSE% results for each forest stand parameter were many percentage points smaller. Thus, the reliability of the estimates improves when databases are used. An example of the RMSE% distribution of the 50 repetitions in Lieksa is shown in Figure 6. Bias was also avoided by using the weighted regression approach, discussed earlier, and the Bias% stayed close to zero. One would expect to have problems with estimates of Pello, because the characteristics of the forest in Pello are very different from the characteristics in the other sites. However, the scatterplots of Figures 2 and 3 show that in terms of total and species-specific forest stand parameter distributions, Pello is predominantly a subset of the other sites. The largest values (e.g., stem number) were not covered by the other sites, but because there is a linear estimate that is unbiased in terms of stem number, those values were well estimated using the calibration set as complemented by

Figure 6. Histograms of the RMSE% values of 50 repeated calibration plot selections in Lieksa, with a randomly selected calibration set of 50 plots for species-specific forest stand parameters of volume V1, V2, and V3. The histograms of the estimates with the calibration set only (top), of the estimates with the calibration set complemented by all the selected database plots (middle), and of the optimal estimates (bottom) are shown. The scale of figures in each column is equal. The median of the results of each database is shown with a vertical bold dashed line, and the minimum and maximum of the range are shown with a vertical dashed line.

databases, even if they did not cover all the variation in Pello (Table 4). The only cases in which the median of RMSE% of the database-assisted estimates is not consistently smaller are those of Loppi-Janakkala G2 and V2 (Table 5) and Juuka N2 and G2. In Figure 3, it is shown that a part of the scatterplot of G2 and V2 of Loppi-Janakkala is not covered by the G2-V2 scatterplots in the other sites. Thus, it is expected that some types of Loppi-Janakkala species 2 type plots are missing from the databases and that the databaseassisted estimates are incorrect. This can be seen in Figure 7, in which the under-coverage of the database plots using one selection of calibration set plots is shown, and the effect of missing training set values on the estimates is illustrated. The large values of both G2 and V2 present in LoppiJanakkala are poorly estimated. In addition, the under-cov-

erage of the calibration set in terms of G2-V2 distribution causes under-coverage in the plots selected from the database. Such plots are not accepted into the training set, because the plot selection is performed with respect to the calibration set distribution characteristics.

Discussion and Conclusions

In this article, the procedure for the use of databases in estimation of total forest stand parameters introduced earlier by the authors (Junttila et al. 2010) was extended to the estimation of species-specific forest stand parameters with multiple databases. The modified procedure was shown to retain the accuracy of the total parameter estimates attained with the original procedure. Estimation of species-specific forest stand parameters

Figure 7. Left: scatterogram of G2-V2 plot distribution in Loppi-Janakkala (, new site plots; E, calibration plots; , selected database plots). The true new site plot distribution is only partly covered by the calibration set and database plots. Middle, G2 as a function of 50th percentile height of the first LiDAR returns (Hf50%) (, new site plots; , selected database plots). The plots of the new site, which represent forest types that are not covered by the selected database plots, are marked with . Right: true forest stand parameters G2 and V2 plotted against the estimates derived using only the calibration set data () and using calibration set data complemented by accepted database plots ( ).
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with database information showed promising results. As might be expected, the best results for the new site estimates were derived by using several hundred measured plots from the new site and then using them again to predict the forest stand parameters for the rest of the new site. If there are databases that have characteristics similar to the ones of the new site, it is possible to achieve estimates close to optimal level by using only 50 plots from the new site itself. However, LiDAR data and the two features derived from the digital aerial photographs do not correlate well enough with the species-specific forest stand parameters, and thus, the species-specific estimates are less accurate than the estimates of total forest stand parameters. In the future, data from other sources also need to be included in the model to improve the overall accuracy of species-specific forest stand parameter estimates. According to the results presented, it seems that the use of plot databases can improve the accuracy of forest inventory results computed with a small number of sample plots. Furthermore, plot databases can be adopted in such a way that the resulting improvement in the accuracy of these estimates is robust against considerable variability in LiDAR equipment and flight parameters, as well as in types of forest. Although the accuracy of such results mostly falls short of that obtained with an extensive field campaign, the savings in cost from using plot databases are also considerable. Potential additional cost is mostly due to preprocessing of plot databases and involves method development and computation only. The method adopted in the current study is but one among many possible alternatives, and we make no claims that it is the optimal one. Some evident improvement could be obtained by preprocessing digital aerial image features too, but this would require an approach different from the one used on LiDAR features here. The results obtained for the test site Loppi-Janakkala indicate that little improvement in the accuracy of estimates can be expected if the total variability of forest type in the target area is not represented in the databases. Whether this situation can be addressed by changing the method and distributions used in plot selection remains a topic of further work. The same observation is also true of the set of calibration plots. The calibration plots must also faithfully represent the extremes of forest type that are present in the target area. If the number of calibration plots is small, it seems advisable not to cluster them, as this tends to decrease the variability present in the set of plots. This effect was displayed with the Matalansalo test site, where both clustered and nonclustered calibration plot selection methods were tried. When looking at the cost-benefit analysis of plot databases, we can refer to the operational practice of inventory by compartments. The accuracy of LiDAR-based estimation, with a plot-level error in total timber volume of slightly more than 20% and a corresponding stand-level error of some 15% (Heikkila 2010), is clearly superior to the esti mation accuracy of inventory by compartments (Haara and Korhonen 2004). In species-specific estimation, the accuracy of both methods is quite similar. The estimated cost of inventory by compartments in 324
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Finland exceeds 10 /ha. In a typical LiDAR inventory project, with 100,000 ha, the cost per ha of LiDAR and inventory calculations is less than 1 . The cost of measuring 1,000 sample plots adds another 1 /ha to the cost, thereby more than doubling it. If only 100 plots were measured and plot databases were used instead, the cost of field measurement would come down to 0.10 /ha, and the total cost would be reduced by 40% or more. Because the accuracy of the species-specific estimates seen in our experimental results is still better than with compartmentbased estimation, this is an attractive possibility. An effort worth making is to keep refining the use of plot databases to the point at which their adoption could even improve on the accuracy of forest parameter estimation that is obtainable with extensive field campaigns. This potential rests with the extremely large variance in forest types that large plot databases can represent. By a judicious match between the type of target forest and the selection of plots from databases, it should be possible to represent any forest to a very high degree of detail in its variability. However, much additional work seems necessary before this goal can be achieved.

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