Forest Fragmentation and Connectivity Across the United States

National Land Cover Data (NLCD) was reclassified to analyze forest edges, producing three grids representing forest connectivity, natural fragmentation, and human-caused fragmentation. The dataset visualizes patterns across the contiguous United States, highlighting regional differences like western natural fragmentation and eastern anthropogenic impacts. It was created by CEOS_EXTRA using NLCD data.

Use Cases

• Quantify human-caused forest fragmentation using the 'forest anthropogenic edges' grid to model urban and agricultural expansion.
• Assess forest ecosystem connectivity by analyzing the 'forest forest edges' grid to identify core habitat areas.
• Map natural disturbance patterns like wildfires by examining regions where 'forest natural edges' or 'transitional' anthropogenic classifications dominate.
• Study riparian corridor health in arid regions by identifying blue-shaded zones in the visualization where forest edges neighbor other natural land covers.
• Compare regional fragmentation drivers by analyzing the dominant edge type grids between the western and eastern United States.

Strengths

• Provides a national-scale analysis covering the contiguous United States.
• Derives three distinct analytical grids (forest, forest-natural, forest-anthropogenic edges) from a standardized land cover source (NLCD).
• Visual interpretation includes specific, documented examples like post-1988 wildfire effects in Yellowstone and the Mississippi River valley.

Limitations

• Exact spatial resolution, row/column counts, and file size are unspecified.
• Temporal coverage and recency of the underlying NLCD data are unknown, potentially limiting contemporary analysis.
• Method treats 'transitional' land cover classes (e.g., burned areas) as anthropogenic use, which may conflate natural and human causes.

Provenance

Source

CEOS_EXTRA, derived from National Land Cover Data (NLCD).

Collection Method

NLCD reclassification into forest, other natural, and anthropogenic categories, followed by edge analysis within a defined window.

Geography

Contiguous United States, with specific mentions of the West, East, Midwest, Yellowstone, the Mississippi River valley, and Las Vegas.