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Landscape Ecosystem Classification (LEC) is a technique used to predict forest productivity, species composition, vegetation structure, and species and landscape level diversity for foresters, ecologists, wildlife biologists and other natural resource managers. The purpose is to identify units of land distributed across the landscape that are similar relative to type, structure and productivity of vegetation. The approach is ecological because it integrates three major components of the forest ecosystem- landform, soils and vegetation. The LEC model process results in the simplification of the landscape into three to six site units for a given physiographic region, as opposed to a multitude of 10 to 15 or more site types as with traditional multi-factor approaches.
ESI has acquired the expertise through Dr. Steve Jones to offer an ecological landscape classification service. Dr. Jones developed this approach for the southern United States through 20 years of research and development, mostly in cooperation with the USDA Forest Service. To date, the approach has been tested and successfully applied in the lower and upper Atlantic and Gulf Coastal Plain, the southern Piedmont, and the southern Blue Ridge Mountains. For those clients within regions where LEC models have been developed, we offer the expertise to map forest lands using Geographic Information Systems. For those clients outside the areas of applicability of existing LEC models, we can refine existing models or develop new models for any region. |
