Ecological Modelling
Landscape Modelling using TELSA and VDDT: Defining the bounds of natural variability in the Great Lakes St. Lawrence Forest
Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources
Forest management for the preservation of biodiversity requires an understanding of the natural range of variability associated with the landscape vegetation conditions under which wildlife and plant species have evolved for thousands of years. This pre-European settlement "natural" range of variability has been altered in North America over the last two centuries by anthropogenic factors such as timber harvest and fire suppression. Understanding the pre-settlement vegetation condition is important to the establishment of targets for future landscape condition.
The Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources (OMNR) is developing a Landscape Planning Guide for the Great Lakes St. Lawrence Forest of Ontario. As part of this process, ESSA worked with the OMNR to develop long-term, large-scale, spatially explicit simulations of pre-settlement fire, insect pest and succession dynamics. We used the Vegetation Dynamics Development Tool (VDDT) and the Tool for Exploratory Landscape Scenario Analyses (TELSA) to simulate several landscapes of up to 1 million ha in size for 1000 years, and replicated these simulations using Monte Carlo Analysis. The results of these simulated ranges of natural variability are being used to aid in the development of contemporary forest management guidelines.