Introduction

Abstract

Forestry has offered a fertile environment for data analysts to operate in since forest measurements began. Forestry datasets are typically voluminous, hierarchical, messy, multi-faceted, and expensive. The challenges that forest managers face are complex, and the costs of poor decisions can be high. On the other hand, often, but not always, decisions are made over long time frames, and there is time for considered data analysis. Forestry data analysts are fortunate to work in a space in which the data and the resources are usually sufficient to do something that is more useful than doing nothing.