Download SHP/KML/GPX for cruises

One of the top feature requests for Plot Hound was for SHP/KML/GPX downloads of stand bounds and plot locations.  Now it's easy to get these files - just look on your cruise page and you'll see a new "Download" dropdown.

Quick Add for Plot Hound

One of our top requests (usually from those of you working in southern pine plantations) has been for a quicker way to add measurements for your most common trees.  Today we're rolling out a change that should really speed up your cruising.

On your "Trees" screen, you'll now see a mini-form for entering a species and diameter.  Simply select the species and diameter you'd like, and then hit "Quick add tree" to add that measurement.  You can hit the button multiple times to add multiple trees, as shown below.

You'll also notice that we've also sped up data entry for the "old" screen too.   We've focused on making everything feel much snappier so that you can focus more on cruising and less on data entry.

New Year, New Graphs

At SilviaTerra, we're welcoming in the new year with a total refresh. Our redesign was focused on formatting and presenting your data in a way that makes it easy to understand.

If you've been using the Plot Hound app or website lately, you've probably noticed a clean new look that puts your data front and center. One of the biggest changes we made was improving the quality of the graphs that get generated when a cruise is completed.

We’ve tweaked the diameter distribution graphs that are produced as part of your basic cruise summary.  Now you'll see additional graphs that show different views of the data, emphasizing different aspects of the forest composition.

Over the next few weeks we’ll do a series of blog posts talking about those graphs in more detail, highlighting some of the differences among the various new graphs and providing some guidelines for interpreting them.

The best gets better - Plot Hound improvements in 2014

At SilviaTerra, we're on a mission to build the best tools in forestry.  We're kicking off the new year with a couple big improvements to the website and Plot Hound app.  Our focus was on simplicity, speed, and beauty.  Here's to another year of pushing forest inventory forward - easier, faster, and cleaner than ever before.

Plot Hound

In September 2013, SilviaTerra welcomed a new member to the crew.  In his first few months, Samad rewrote Plot Hound from the ground up to be more responsive and intuitive than ever.  You should notice an improved syncing experience and significantly faster data entry.  He also added features for collaborative cruising and cruise notes/instructions.

Quickly enter diameters from a select drop down or type them in manually

See who is assigned to each plot

Website

Over the past few months, you've probably noticed some big changes on the website.  Not only did many pages get much faster, but we've added collaborative cruising features and totally redone your cruise reports to make them more informative and elegant than ever.

Setting up cruises has never been simpler. You can now include instructions for the cruiser too.

Find stands easily with state/county listings and a search bar

Cruise reports are automatic, informative, and beautiful. More details coming in a future post

Lots more coming over the next few weeks - so don't be a stranger round these parts!

Volume Reports Graduate from Beta!

We're proud to announce that volume reports have graduated from "beta"!  We've rolled out a number of improvements to provide you with the maximum amount of information while keeping bloat to a minimum.

Over the past 6 months, we've received lots of feedback from you all on our "beta" volume reporting service.  In that time, we've received lots of inquiries about the volume calculations.  Common ones include:

• What exactly is in a SilviaTerra volume report?
• How are total and merchantable heights estimated?
• How are volume equations selected in each region?
• How are trees merchandised into products?

Over the coming weeks, we'll show you what's going on under the hood and dive into the details of each of these questions.  As always, please post any questions or comments below and we'll get right back to you.

Plot Reduce - Fewer Plots, Same Accuracy

We're rolling out a new service to cut your fieldwork in half.  Welcome to Plot Reduce.

At SilviaTerra, our mission is to help build the future of forestry by providing foresters with the best tools possible.  In the past three years, we've worked with some of the top REITs/TIMOs and hundreds of foresters to create:

• Timber Scout: remotely-sensed forest inventory (5,000 acres and up)
• Plot Hound: simple, modern Android and iOS cruising app

Today, we're excited to announce a new service that combines the best of both of these tools.  For your next cruise, use Plot Reduce to cut your fieldwork in half.

How It Works

In a normal grid cruise, you're attempting to measure all the variability within the forest by taking a lot of samples.  Plot Reduce uses satellite imagery to pick out the variability in the forest ahead of time, so you only measure the plots that you need to.  Plot Reduce also clumps the plots together to minimize your travel time.

Getting started with Plot Reduce is easy:

1. You upload stand boundaries to the SilviaTerra website
2. We handle all the remote-sensing work and send you the plot locations to measure
3. You cruise (we recommend Plot Hound, but any system will work)
4. You upload the cruise to the SilviaTerra website (easy with Plot Hound - or you can upload an Excel file)
5. We pair the plot data with the satellite imagery to generate a stand table for each stand
6. You log in to the website to view beautiful reports and download the stand tables

Cruising Comparison

Service	# of Plots	Min Acreage
Plot Hound	Same as conventional cruising	N/A
Plot Reduce	Half as many as conventional cruising	200 acres
Timber Scout	SilviaTerra collects all plot data	5,000 acres

Who Should Use Plot Reduce?

We built Plot Reduce with consulting foresters in mind.  Using Plot Reduce, you can double or triple your number of clients while keeping your amount of field work the same.  If you're interested in growing your business with Plot Reduce, request an invite today!

For government foresters with the Forest Service or the Department of Natural Resources, Plot Reduce can help stretch a tight budget by cutting cruising costs by up to 50%.   If you think we could help, please get in touch with us here.

The Future

All of our services are constantly improving.  We recently rolled out volume reports and just did a total website upgrade.   Keep an eye out for even more this summer!

Website Upgrade

If you've visited our website in the past few days, you've probably noticed some serious changes.  Hold on to your iPad, because we're not in Kansas anymore.

Over the past 6 months, we've experienced massive growth in the number of users on Plot Hound.  We're now at over 1,500 registered users and tens of thousands of plots.

Although the app had been constantly improving, our website had remained much the same.  It was time to launch a bold new look and feel that communicated our core mission: building simple, beautiful, and powerful tools to help foresters engage with the land.

Here's what we came up with:

We didn't stop there.  If you log in to your account, you'll notice that the interface for cruise management has been re-imagined as well.

Great maps are an essential tool for great forestry.  So we made maps first-class citizens in our new redesign.  We've shrunken headers and sidebars and expanded our maps to take up almost the entire screen - giving you a big, beautiful workspace.

Pro tip: hit the F11 button on your keyboard to go FULL full-screen

The new cruise creation page is all map, all the time

All these upgrades are part of our mission to provide foresters with the best tools available.  Keep your eye out for more improvements - we're not stopping any time soon.

Love Plot Hound?  Check out our new service that will turbo-charge your cruising: 
Plot Reduce