A method to derive a tree survival model from any existing stand survival model

This study addresses a situation when a forest manager has been using a whole-stand model that seems to predict well for his/her stands, and now wants to derive an individual-tree model from it to form an integrated system that can perform well at both stand and tree levels. A simple method was developed to derive tree survival models from three existing stand-level survival models. The derived tree survival models were based on the difference between diameter of the tree in question and the diameter where tree and stand survival probabilities are equal. For stand survival prediction, each stand model performed less adequately than its derived tree model, and one of the derived tree survival models was the best overall. For prediction of tree survival, the same derived tree model also performed best overall. Even though only three stand-level survival models were considered in this study, the method presented here should be applicable to any stand survival model. When no tree survival data are available, an attempt of deriving tree models from stand survival models resulted in models, albeit the lowest ranked in terms of performance, that produced acceptable evaluation statistics for predicting tree-level survival.The accepted manuscript in pdf format is listed with the files at the bottom of this page. The presentation of the authors' names and (or) special characters in the title of the manuscript may differ slightly between what is listed on this page and what is listed in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript; that in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript is what was submitted by the author