Chorological maps for the main European woody species

This article complements the work in the production of the European Atlas of Forest Tree Species by the European Commission Joint Research Centre. Numerous species presence maps and occurrence geodatabases have been collected, digitalized, and loaded in a geographical information system (GIS) software. By combining historical books providing complete species distribution maps and more recent scientific literature and atlases, a set of updated chorological maps have been produced for the main European tree and shrub species in ESRI shapefile format. The geometries of the shapefiles describe the presence of each species as polygons (continuous area of presence) and points (presence in isolated populations). Since the maps represent the species chorology, this geodatabase is intended to provide a synthetic continental-scale overview of the species ranges; therefore the presence/absence geometries should not be considered precise at local level. Errors and imprecisions derived from the interpretation and digitalization processes are probable, especially in those areas where little information is available. To address current data gaps, corrections and updates of the chorology dataset can be incorporated when new information sources become available, and the dataset can be expanded to comprise additional species.

CAUDULLO Giovanni;  WELK Erik;  SAN-MIGUEL-AYANZ Jesus; 

2017-09-28

ELSEVIER BV

JRC104492

2352-3409,   

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352340917301981?via%3Dihub,    https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC104492,   

10.1016/j.dib.2017.05.007,