Percent tree canopy cover is a measure of local tree density that has a variety of applications in wildlife habitat analysis, fire behavior modeling, carbon accounting, and hydrologic analysis. Using medium spatial resolution imagery (30m) from Landsat, we have produced consistent, seamless per-pixel estimates of percent tree canopy cover ranging from 0 to 100 percent. The Santa Barbara region has a maximum of 75% tree canopy coverage, which is why there are no 100% designations.

This dataset is part of the larger National Land Cover Database (NLCD) that also includes information on land cover, percent imperviousness, and percent shrub/grass. The NLCD effort is coordinated by a partnership of federal agencies called the Multi-Resolution Land Characteristics (MRLC) Consortium ( www.mrlc.gov ).

The U.S. Forest Service (USFS) built multiple versions of percent tree canopy cover data, including the tree canopy cover data that are included with the NLCD. The NLCD tree canopy cover data were designed as an integrated data stack for users in the NLCD community who are in need of coordinated datasets/layers that have the characteristic of “Time 1 TCC + change in TCC = Time 2 TCC”.

In addition to the NLCD tree canopy cover products, the USFS built and distributes “Analytical” and “Cartographic” versions of the tree canopy cover products. The “Analytical” version of the USFS tree canopy cover data prioritizes objectivity and statistics over visual appearance of the product. The “Cartographic” version of the USFS tree canopy cover data includes masking of some of the TCC values output from the modeling process, and it prioritizes the visual appearance of the TCC maps for cartographic uses. The “Analytic” and “Cartographic” versions of the datasets were documented and are described in more detail and available at https://data.fs.usda.gov/geodata/rastergateway/treecanopycover/ , while the NLCD tree canopy cover products are available through the Multi-Resolution Land Characteristics Consortium (MRLC) at www.mrlc.gov .