Methodology

The Long-term Forest Ecosystem Research programme LWF is build on four different categories of sites. 

• Annual assessments of the Sansilva Inventory's systematic network serve to provide early warning indications about the condition of the Swiss forests.
  
• Continuous measurements of environmental factors and observation of forest condition on long-term research plots, allow the evaluation and meaningful conclusions on possible causes of changes and future scenarios. Measurements are based on international standard methods and quality control as set down in the ICP Forests Manuals.
  
• The long-term research sites of the LWF programme provide a gateway to other monitoring networks. For example, the Federal Office for the Environmental FOEN financed TreeNet makes use of LWF and IAP sites.
  
• Additional sites where treatments and/or experiments occur, extend the LWF programme in order to answer specific questions on cause-effect relationships in ecologically relevant issues. 

The following scheme provides an overview of the applied types of measurements and installed sensors. In order to learn more about a particular type of measurement, or whom to contact, please click on the measuring sensors and collectors (bold print) in the vector graphic and following PDF document (for new SVG compatible browsers).

Explanations to the individual types of measurements and sensors are also listed in the following table (for non SVG compatible browsers).