Google Earth Engine App

Swiss standing deadwood

Visualize deadwood distribution across Swiss forests at national scale, derived from high-resolution aerial images. Maps standing dead trees across forested areas of Switzerland. For methods and further details, see the accompanying study.

Layers

Segmentation

Deadwood segmentation (10 cm)

Semantic segmentation of standing deadwood from SWISSIMAGE 10 cm orthophotos, reference years 2018–2023. Includes all reference years. The Google Earth Engine basemap shows only the most recent SWISSIMAGE available, causing potential mismatches.

Aerial images & segmentations

SWISSIMAGE orthophotos with overlaid deadwood segmentations from sample sites across Switzerland.

Deadwood share

Standing deadwood (100 m) [%]

Deadwood segmentation aggregated to 100 m resolution over forested areas. Temporal composite showing the most recent detection per surveyed area. $$\text{deadwood share} = \frac{\text{deadwood area}}{\text{forest area per pixel}}$$

Standing deadwood (10 m) [%]

Same as Standing deadwood (100 m), at 10 m resolution.

Deadwood share by canton

Per canton, based on the most recent segmentation available. $$\text{deadwood share} = \frac{\text{deadwood area}}{\text{forest area per canton}}$$

Deadwood share by district

Same as Deadwood share by canton, at district level.

Reference

Forest ecoregions

FOEN Swiss forest ecoregions (Forest ecoregions | opendata.swiss).

Year of detection

Most recent deadwood segmentation year for each area of Switzerland.