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EVALUATION OF METRIC PRECISION FOR A RIPARIAN FOREST SURVEY
Citation:
Barker, J. R., M. A. Bollman, P L. Ringold, J. Sackinger, AND S P. Cline. EVALUATION OF METRIC PRECISION FOR A RIPARIAN FOREST SURVEY. ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING AND ASSESSMENT. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, Netherlands, 75:51-72, (2002).
Description:
This paper evaluates the performance of a protocol to monitor riparian forests in western Oregon based on the quality of the data obtained from a recent field survey. Precision and accuracy are the criteria used to determine the quality of 19 field metrics. The field survey consisted of 110 riparian sites on public and private lands that were sampled during the summers of 1996 and 1997. In order to calculate precision and accuracy of the field metrics, some of the plots were re-measured. The precision and accuracy reported in the literature for similar metrics measured in other forest inventories was used as a benchmark for comparison. The plot-scale geomorphology metrics were generally imprecise and inaccurate, while the forest stand inventory metrics and forest canopy metrics, with a couple of exceptions were precise and accurate. The precision of many of the field metrics compared favorably with the level of precision for similar metrics reported in the literature. Suggestions are made on ways to improve the precision and accuracy for some of the metrics for this survey and future surveys.