I am very much interested in point pattern analysis, and I can imagine many applications that are useful in science. However, I have no clue whether such spatial point pattern analyses are also applied in real workflows of forestry companies, and if not why not.
Would be great if anyone has an opinion to share.
The spatial pattern of forest fires is of interest for fire occurrence prediction and for understanding the role of fire in the landscape
Point pattern mapping may be used in forestry to identify individual stands of specific types of trees, the location of diseased trees in the greater forest, of critical habitat features across a wider forested areas. As to "work flows," it depends on the work. I think the easiest answer here is that the data returned in this form provides the raw materials by which one manages the forest, deals with arborial disease, etc.
Depending on the type of data involved, you may be able to assess the extent of species mingling in mixed-species stands of trees.
There are new articles dealing with species mortality, mingling, competition (cluster or segregation patterns). Basically the geographical location of the trees has a certain ecological meaning. I read many articles of Dr. S. Gentzin and T. Wiegand on this topic: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=liEc384AAAAJ&hl=en
Thank you for your answers. However, I doubt that these are really wanted by e.g. people who work in forestry. Why, except for pure research interest, would mingling of species be of interest to a practicioner? The infected trees example is maybe a good one but one would need to have a map for all single trees (this is feasible) but one should also know which tree is infected (not possible?). If this is already known for all trees, one would not need the point pattern analysis anymore. I was thinking of maybe describing the diversity or structure of a (managed) forest, but why should this be of interest for practicioners?
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