About this map

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About this map

This interactive map presents tree canopy across Ireland. Each circle signifies the crown of one of Ireland's 100+ million trees growing either in forests (green) or outside forests (pink). We have calculated overall canopy cover (crown area, as a % of land area) nationally, by county, municipal district, local authority – and settlement.

Data sources & methodology

Data is derived from the first National Tree Map (NTM^TM) a commercial database, produced in 2020 by Bluesky International, now part of the Woolpert company (see www.bluesky-world.ie).

We cross-referenced the NTM^TM with

• forest parcel boundary data (produced by DAFM (Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine), and Coillte, published under the Creative Commons (CC by 4.0) license, via https://data.gov.ie/) which allowed us to classify trees as Forest Trees (FT) or Trees Outside Forests (TOF) depending on whether they grew on land catalogued as forest, or on land outside forest
• administrative boundaries concerning counties, built-up areas, municipal districts and local authorities (provided by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) and Tailte Éireann, available from Tailte Éireann Surveying Open data portal) which allowed us to compute canopy cover at a national, county and local scale, including settlement by settlement.

TreeMAP Ireland, based on data gathered between 2018 and 2020, is overlain on current Esri basemaps within the Esri online environment, this allows us to visualise change. The basemaps differ from the high-resolution aerial imagery flown by Bluesky, and used to produce the NTM, but the differences highlight changes that have taken place in the past 5 years, where trees have been planted or felled during development for example.

How to use the map

• Map controls – search, zoom, basemap switcher, and the Home button – are in the top left corner of the screen.
• The map starts with a national overview as an aerial basemap image. Toggle between basemaps to change the underlying map.
• The county list sorts canopy by total area, by total % cover, and by forest/non-forest distribution. Select a county from the list, or type an address into the search bar, to zoom in for detail.
• Switch between Built-up Areas / Municipal District / Local Authority tabs to explore canopy at various administrative levels. Use the toggles to show/hide layers.
• Zoom in to a neighbourhood. Click any tree crown on the map for details of that individual crown.
• Click the Home button or Reset to return to the overview, or zoom in directly to explore across the entire country, across county boundaries, without selecting a county first.
• Press Esc to close open panels, popups, and this information window.

Disclaimers

This map was produced using commercial data provided by Bluesky International, as well as government owned data that is freely available under the Creative Commons 4.0 International license. The Bluesky/Woolpert NTM^TM is the most detailed database that exists of Ireland's trees, this and all other datasets used to compile this map are the most up to date available. However, all such datasets contain anomalies which we explain in more detail elsewhere. Anomalies concern (some of) the administrative boundary areas provided by the government, as well as (some) tree heights, crown areas and numbers, and the occasional misidentification of non-tree objects. See www.treelab.ie.

Contact & attribution

For questions and/or feedback, contact Sophia Meeres at sophia.meeres@ucd.ie.

TreeMAP Ireland ©

Canopy Outside Forest Forest Canopy

County Canopy

Sort A-Z Highest canopy cover Highest canopy area (ha) Highest Forest Canopy Highest Canopy Outside Forest Reset