Tree Allometry Data Chain

Sunday, October 23, 2011

D. Delgerjargal studies trees to establish allometric relationships between tree stem diameter and its biomass. Here is the data chain for her work:

  • visit potential field sites and decide on which one is going to be our research site based on certain criteria such as plantation quality and distance to site
map of study site courtesy D. Delgerjargal under a CC-BY 3.0 License

  • go to the field and measure trees for diameter at breast height (dbh) and enter plot size, plot number, tree number, and dbh in MS-Excel spreadsheet

  • selectively cut some of the trees for "destructive analysis" on-site and weigh the biomass components of trees for wet mass and take sample branches and stem discs for further analysis to the lab

tree stem disc courtesy D. Delgerjargal under a CC-BY 3.0 License
  • categorize biomass samples into tissue types (stem, branch and foliage) and weigh them for wet mass and then dry them in the oven to obtain dry-mass
stem dry mass image courtesy D. Delgerjargal under a CC-BY 3.0 License

  • take foliage sub-samples and measure for leaf area

  • use the wet-to-dry mass ratio to estimate dry-mass of biomass components of whole tree

  • do statistical analysis to see if it meets certain assumptions, and if not, then transform the data to see if it meets the assumptions

  • establish allometric relationships between stem diameter and dry mass of biomass components

  • compose allometric equations in R

  • validate and compare equations and produce plots and charts