Variable plots in forestry, prototype app

Split the trees on each plot into understorey, midstorey and overstorey in Arboreal Forest, and see basal area, diameter and trees per hectare for every layer.

Arboreal Forest now does the whole variable radius plot on your phone – from the prism tree count to the diameter and height of the sample trees, selected with Big BAF.

When we launched, this app was called Arboreal Tree Height. We dropped that last word a while ago — here's everything else that's in there. A new tutorial for the iOS version walks through diameter, circumference, crown shape, crown width and height, and how to measure a tree you can't even get close to. Under three minutes.

We tested the new digital tape measure in Arboreal Tree against a tape measure across 203 measurements and 8 devices. Mean deviation is 6.8 mm and R² = 0.998 — here's the full evaluation.

For two decades, recognising a log from the features it already carries — no tag, no paint, no barcode — was a research problem. It's now mature enough to deploy. Here's how the field got here, and what it took to turn it into a working service.

A new digital tape measure in Arboreal Tree wraps around the trunk and gives you diameter, circumference, and cross-sectional area at once — built for the thickest trees, and it works even on phones without LiDAR.