SPATIAL CHARACTERISTICS OF FOREST CLEARING AND VEGETATION REGROWTH ASDETECTED BY LANDSAT THEMATIC MAPPER IMAGERY

Spatial characteristics of forest clearing and vegetation regrowth in the Peten Region of northern Guatemala were analyzed. Forest change de tection procedures were applied to compare size and shape of forest cl earing fallow clearing, and regrowth patches between two study sites. The results revealed that there were only half as many new forest clea rings in 1990 along the Guatemala border as in the vicinity of Carmeli ta; they were, however, twice as large (($) over bar X = 3.98 ha) as t he forest clearings at Carmelita (($) over bar X = 2.04 ha). The mean size of regrowth patches along the border were less than half the size of new clearings; however, the clearing and regrowth patches at Carme lita were approximately equal in size and number. The ratio of forest clearing to regrowth area was one to one at Carmelita but nearly 3 to 1 along the border. Over 90 percent of all new clearings and regrowth patches were within 3 km of known roads at both study sites. These res ults indicate that spatial characteristics of forest clearing can be m onitored by multi-date Landsat imagery and suggest differences in soci o-economic factors operating at the two study sites. A method of separ ating fallow clearing from deforestation estimates is presented and di scussed.