Inland Temperate Rainforest and Interior Wetbelt Forest, BC

The Conservation Biology Institute’s spatial analysis to identify intact forest takes timber harvest cutblocks, agriculture and municipal development footprints, ski area footprints, and infrastucture buffers for road classes, railroads, and transmission lines into account.

Buffer distances for infrastructure were provided by the BC Government via Conservation North, as follows:
1. Lanes, trails, alleyways, driveways, unclassified roads= 10m
2. Railways, ramps, local, recreation, resource, restricted, runway, service, and strata roads = 30m
3. Arterials, collector roads, highways, freeways = 60m

An additional 100m buffer was applied to timber cutblocks and infrastructure buffers (roads, transmission lines, railroads) to account for disturbance effects at forest edges. Note, this is a very conservative (low) estimate of anthropogenic impacts, and areas of impact are likely greater than depicted, esp. when indirect impacts are taken into account.

Input data were buffered, merged, and converted to raster at 90m resolution.

Water bodies larger than one hectare in area were masked out of the final forested areas.

Inland Temperate Rainforest was identified from the VRI, as follows:

(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vk' AND BEC_VARIANT = '1') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vk' AND BEC_VARIANT = '2') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wk' AND BEC_VARIANT = '1') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wk' AND BEC_VARIANT = '2') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wk' AND BEC_VARIANT = '3') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wk' AND BEC_VARIANT = '4')

Interior Wetbelt forest was identified from the VRI, as follows:(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'mc') OR \n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'mh') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'mk') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'mm') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'mmp') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'mmw') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'mv') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'mvp') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'mw') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vc') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vcp') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vcw' ) OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vk') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wc') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wcp') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wcw') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wh') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wk') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wm') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wmp') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ICH' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wmw') OR\n\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wmw') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wmp') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wm') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wk') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wh') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wcw') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wcp') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'wc') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vk') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vcw') OR\n(BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vcp') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vc') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'ESSF' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'mm') OR (BEC_ZONE_CODE = 'SBS' AND BEC_SUBZONE = 'vk')