IMAGE INTERPRETATION KEYS FOR THE MAPPING OF SIBERIAN FORESTS

Abstract

The paper describes efforts by Russian silviculturists to develop interpretation keys for principal forest species on large-scale space photographs of an experimental plot in Tomsk Oblast of West Siberia. More specifically, the effort involved using such features of the photographic images as color, tone, texture, structure, size, shape, and indirect or contextual keys (terrain features) to ascertain such forest valuation indices as stand composition (dark coniferous, light coniferous, broadleaved, etc.), stand age (young versus old), canopy closure (0.1-0.4, 0.5-0.7, and 0.8-1.0), productivity (yield classes I-IV, V-Va), and slope steepness and exposure. Translated by Edward Torrey, Alexandria, Virginia from: Geografiya i prirodnyye resursy, 2001, No. 1, pp. 118-120.