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The stability of forest areas in Slovenia as a criterion of landscape diversity and durability

Janez Pirnat and Andrej Kobler (2014) The stability of forest areas in Slovenia as a criterion of landscape diversity and durability. Acta Silvae et Ligni (104). pp. 35-42. ISSN 2335-3112

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    Abstract

    The stability of forest core areas is an important indicator of biotic diversity on a landscape level in the process of deciding whether certain forests could be cleared. Consequently, we decided to estimate the stability of forest core areas in Slovenia between 1975 and 2012, as we are in possession of sufficiently accurate data to make a comparison of forest cover for these 38 years. Four types of changes in forest coverage (stable non-forest, deforestations, overgrowing and stable forest) are explained with an empiric model designed as a decision tree, which takes into account the altitude, the slope of the terrain, ground type, the distance of each cell on a raster map from the forest edge in the base year and the distance of each cell on a raster map from the nearest settlement in the base year. Explanatory models were built using the method of machine learning (Quinlan, 1986) using See5 (www.rulequest.com). The accuracy of the chosen model was 74.65%. In 2012, stable forests covered 53 % of Slovenia; their coverage has remained unchanged since 1975. From all the variables, land-use changes are best explained by the initial distance from the forest edge and partially by the slope of the terrain. The distance from settlements and the altitude, on the other hand, do not play a significant role.

    Item Type: Article
    Keywords: stability of core area, persistent forests, Slovenia, land-use change
    Link to COBISS: http://www.cobiss.si/scripts/cobiss?command=SEARCH&base=COBIB&select=ID= 4040102
    Divisions: Biotechnical Faculty, Department of Forestry > Group for Landscape forestry and spatial informatics
    Slovenian Forestry Institute > Department of Forest and Landscape Planning and Monitoring
    Item ID: 1115
    Date Deposited: 10 Feb 2015 10:25
    Last Modified: 30 May 2016 14:28
    URI: http://eprints.gozdis.si/id/eprint/1115

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