Heureka Forest Decision Support System

The system can be used to analyse impacts from different ways of using the forest on its economic, ecological and social values, and to find combinations of forest management strategies that can balance multiple objectives of forest management. 

The software packages 
The Heureka system consists of four software packages. Three of them simulate how the forest develops over time depending on how it is managed; StandWise, PlanWise and RegWise. The fourth, PlanEval, is used to compare different scenarios of forest development so that several forest management objectives can be achieved. 

To simulate forest development in StandWise, PlanWise and RegWise, a variety of models are used for tree growth, the effect of different forest management measures, dead wood decomposition, soil carbon sequestration and other ecosystem processes. The models describe the development of many different aspects over time, ranging from the state of the forest to its economic and timber production implications. They also provide a range of other outputs describing forest ecosystem services, biodiversity, and the susceptibility of forests to root rot, storms and spruce bark beetle. 

The forest management measures that can be simulated are: 

-Regeneration (planting, seeding or self-rejuvenation; with or without soil preparation)
-Pre-commercial thinning
-Thinning (with or without fuel extraction)
-Fertilization
-Final felling (with or without fuel extraction; with or without leaving seed or screen trees)
-Continuous cover forestry (selective felling)
-Checkerboard management (PlanWise and RegWise) 

Different forms of tree (group) retention can also be simulated, such as mimicking yielding entire buffer zones (e.g. edge zones or tree groups) and edge zones around watercourses or yielding individual retention trees and high stumps during thinning and final felling. The results of the analysis are presented in tables, diagrams and maps.