Modeling Forest Species Distributions in a Human-Dominated Landscape in Northeastern, USA

Mapping forest species distributions is notoriously difficult in human-dominated mixed temperate forest environments. The goal of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of species distribution modeling techniques for estimating the distribution of forest canopy species on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, USA. Binary maps of estimated presence/absence were produced for four canopy species using a classification tree approach and a generalized linear modeling approach, both including and excluding a spatial dependence term, and the results are evaluated using several assessment measures. Secondary goals of the study are to examine the influence of past land use on species distributions at the landscape scale and to consider the effect of explicitly including information on spatial dependence. Findings suggest that these techniques are broadly applicable in such human-dominated landscapes, but that complex disturbance histories introduce significant challenges.