With the advent of “bucking” and efficiency management controls installed on timber harvesting equipment, forestry organisations now have access to a rich data-stream, which can be analysed within a GIS environment. Timber, which is cultivated with machinery fitted with a geographic tracking and scanning devices, can provide a data-stream containing tree location, base elevation, height, diameter, log quality, log count, taper, height and over and under bark volumes for every tree cultivated. Python, an open source scripting language can be utilised to batch process and parse information from tens of thousands of text files into a point mesh dataset, which can be subsequently utilised to investigate harvest yields within a coupe or across a region.
The timber industry in EU is moving towards digital harvesting directives where site descriptions, stand boundaries, maps and aerial photos are provided as a digital timber harvest plan and integrated into the onboard mapping hardware and software of the four leading manufacturers of harvesting computer.