A digital woodland inventory tool that promises a faster and more accurate method for collecting data on forestry resources has undergone its latest, major upgrade, making it even more convenient for woodland owners and managers to value their timber.

myForest, a flagship project of Oxfordshire-based charity, Sylva Foundation, is now enabling users automatic estimation of the timber volume of a woodland stand, simply byentering two parameters for a selection of trees in sample plots. This fully automated process, of converting raw diameter and height measurements into treevolumes and basal areas, is the result of the myForest team digitising thousands of lines of data from the Forest Research Blue Book, the definitive guide on tree and timber measurement.

The myForest inventory tool has been developed in partnership with the Northwoods Innovation Programme, a Forest Commission funded initiative that works with woodland owners and innovators to develop tools and techniques that support woodland management. With this support, myForest has been able to undergo numerous updates, such as creating and downloading geospatial PDF maps.

Sylva’s Head of Forestry, Andrew Clark, said: “We wanted to create a woodland inventory process that required limited user input and be gathered with relative ease. By limiting the data required tospecies, diameter-at-breast height (DBH), and height, this new functionality means the process is accessible to those with limited experience and does not depend on specialist or expensive equipment.”

Northwoods Project Manager, Rosanna Curtis, said: “myForest has added significant capabilities since the start of the Northwoods Innovation Programme. That its users can now automate timber volumes is another big step forwards in bringing innovative techniques to the woodland management process. It’s also important to those who engage with Northwoods to know this technology exists and how to implement it. We will continue to disseminate the great work that Northwoods and Sylva Foundation have undertaken, sharing the myForest developments at our events and in our newsletter whilst also incorporating it into the training courses we run.

Since we launched Northwoods in 2022, over 70% of the 500 people we have directly engaged with have told us they will do something different as a result of the information they received, so we are pleased to bring them further enhancements to innovative tools such as myForest, supporting them to manage their woodland.”

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