Terrestrial Condition Assessment: Grassland Conifer Encroachment at 250m Resolution

Raster data identifying grassland conifer encroachment across the United States, derived from LANDFIRE Biophysical Settings and USGS National Land Cover Database classifications. The dataset is binary, with values indicating likely encroached (1) or not encroached (0) areas at a 250-meter resolution. It is produced by the Department of Agriculture and includes assessments for the years 2020, 2022, and 2023.

Use Cases

• Mapping areas of conifer encroachment into historical grasslands based on LANDFIRE BpS and NLCD classifications.
• Assessing the impact of fire exclusion and climate change on non forest ecosystems using the binary encroachment indicator.
• Prioritizing restoration efforts for specific ecosystems based on the identified encroached raster pixels.
• Analyzing temporal changes in encroachment patterns using data from the 2020, 2022, and 2023 assessment years.

Strengths

• Data is derived from authoritative sources: LANDFIRE Biophysical Settings and USGS National Land Cover Database.
• Provides a clear binary classification (1/0) for encroachment status at a consistent 250-meter resolution.
• Includes temporal coverage for three distinct assessment years (2020, 2022, 2023).

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Data is not available for all years in the 2020-2024 assessment period; only 3 of 5 years are covered.
• The 2023 assessment data is 1-bit, containing only values of 1, differing from the binary format of other years.

Provenance

Source

Department of Agriculture, using LANDFIRE and USGS NLCD data.

Collection Method

Raster analysis combining grassland classifications from LANDFIRE BpS with evergreen forest data from NLCD.

Time Range

Assessment years 2020, 2022, 2023.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 22:50:29.993341; freshness should be verified.

Geography

United States (implied by use of US-wide datasets LANDFIRE and NLCD).