Tree Allometrics

Abies balsamea / Foliage biomass

Canadian national equation, balsam fir, dbh and height (foliage; Table 4)

Foliage biomassAbies balsamea · PinaceaeCanadaRead from the original paper
Photo of Abies balsamea
© Douglas Goldman · CC BY-SA · iNaturalist
Equation

As printed (Eq. 3)

y foliage = β foliage1D βfoliage2Hβfoliage3 + efoliage

In this library's units, ready to compute (kg)

Foliage biomass = 0.1245 * D^2.523 * H^(-1.123)
D
Diameter at breast height (1.3 m), cm
H
Total tree height, m

Foliage is leaves and twigs. r2 is the adjusted R² (AdjRSq) of this compartment in Table 5. Fitted on the original scale (weighted nonlinear seemingly unrelated regression), so there is no back-transform correction. Dead branches, cones and fruits are not part of aboveground biomass in this work (Materials). Stand type was not always recorded. Ung, Bernier & Guo (2008) later revised parameters for some species with British Columbia data; not used here.

Source
bfoliage1 0.1245
Equation · Table 4, Balsam fir
bfoliage2 2.5230
Equation · Table 4, Balsam fir
bfoliage3 –1.1230
Equation · Table 4, Balsam fir
Balsam fir 639 16.4±0.4 12.2±0.2 103.4±4.7
Trees measured · Table 2 (No. of trees)
(1.5;42.4) (1.6;52.2) (0.5;649.0)
Smallest DBH · Table 2, Balsam fir (ranges of dbh, height, total biomass)
Foliage 0.0305 0.58 6.9 2.41 0.1230 0.63 6.5 1.86
R² · Table 5, Balsam fir (AdjRSq in the dbh- and height-based set, second block)
Trees measured
639
DBH range
1.5–42.4 cm
Height range
1.6–52.2 m
R²
0.63
Method
Nonlinear seemingly unrelated regression with weight functions; additivity constrained so compartments sum to total
Where
Canada: Alberta, Manitoba, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Quebec, Saskatchewan (ENFOR archival data, early 1980s)
Last checked
2026-11-03
Calculate
Height from
11.4
Foliage biomass (kg)
5.36
Carbon (kg), ×0.47
19.6
CO₂e (kg), ×44/12
Fitted DBH range010203040506070510152025303540DBH (cm)Foliage biomass (kg)Foliage biomass

Shaded: the DBH range the model was fitted on. Other inputs held at the values above.

Checks this equation passes

On every build, the library's form and the paper's own form (in its units) must both give these values within 1%.

InputsExpectedWe getFrom
D = 20, H = 1511.411.4Computed from the printed form
computed from the published form at dbh = 20 cm, H = 15 m

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