Introduction to fia

Jose Eduardo Meireles

The only goal of the fia package is to programatically download FIA data.

Installation

The easiest way to get the fia package is to install from the github repository.

library("devtools")
devtools::install_github("meireles/fia")

Usage

The fia data lives lives in the FIADB. You can see the default database url using url_fia().

# Load the `fia` library
library("fia")

# Check out the packages' default FIA url
fia::url_fia()

## [1] "https://apps.fs.usda.gov/fia/datamart/CSV/datamart_csv.html"

Finding what data is available

The FIA dataset is complex and composed of many different tables. To find out which tables are available in the FIA, use list_available_tables.

# Retrieve table names from the web
tab = fia::list_available_tables()

## Trying to download tables from:

## "https://apps.fs.usda.gov/fia/datamart/CSV/datamart_csv.html"

# Types of tables available.
print(tab)

## Available FIA data:
##                      objects                   size
##        reference_table_names               20 items
##             data_table_names               57 items
##                  data_states               56 items
##          url_downloaded_from                1 items
##             reference_tables   20 rows by 5 columns
##         data_tables_by_state 3248 rows by 7 columns
##  data_tables_states_combined   57 rows by 5 columns

There are two main types of tables:

• Reference: Prefixed REF. They hold, as the name says, reference data such as species names (REF_SPECIES) and forest types (REF_FOREST_TYPE). You 'll find them in reference_table_names.

• Data: These are tables with plot data (collected at the sites). For example, the individual tree data in TREE or geometry of each plot in PLOTGEOM. You'll find their names inside data_table_names. Note that these individual tables can be obtained:

  • At the state level: The state abbreviations are found inside data_states. A detailed list of state level datasets is given in data_tables_by_state

  • For all states combined: The detailed list of data combined for all states is given inside data_tables_states_combined.

# Check out the names of reference tables
head(tab$reference_table_names)

## [1] "BEGINEND"               "LICHEN_SPECIES_SUMMARY"
## [3] "REF_CITATION"           "REF_FIADB_VERSION"     
## [5] "REF_FOREST_TYPE"        "REF_FOREST_TYPE_GROUP"

# or names of states or plot level data tables
head(tab$data_states)

## [1] "AL" "AK" "AZ" "AR" "CA" "CO"

head(tab$data_table_names)

## [1] "BOUNDARY"                "COND"                   
## [3] "COND_DWM_CALC"           "COUNTY"                 
## [5] "DWM_COARSE_WOODY_DEBRIS" "DWM_DUFF_LITTER_FUEL"

# You can also get a detailed desrciption of the data available in the FIA, e.g.
head(tab$reference_tables)

##                   zip_tables                 csv_tables n_records
## 1               BEGINEND.zip               BEGINEND.csv         2
## 2 LICHEN_SPECIES_SUMMARY.zip LICHEN_SPECIES_SUMMARY.csv      2404
## 3           REF_CITATION.zip           REF_CITATION.csv        35
## 4      REF_FIADB_VERSION.zip      REF_FIADB_VERSION.csv        22
## 5        REF_FOREST_TYPE.zip        REF_FOREST_TYPE.csv       207
## 6  REF_FOREST_TYPE_GROUP.zip  REF_FOREST_TYPE_GROUP.csv        34
##   last_created last_modified
## 1   2013/09/24          <NA>
## 2   2016/08/09    2016/08/09
## 3   2012/10/26          <NA>
## 4   2017/03/03    2016/10/19
## 5   2014/06/18    2009/01/28
## 6   2010/04/21    2010/06/17

Downloading FIA tables

Once you figured out what data you want to grab, all you have to do is download it:

# Pick tables to download
# Chosen from tab$reference_table_names and tab$data_table_names
my_table_names = c("REF_SPECIES",  # a reference table
                   "PLOT")         # a plot data table

# Pick states of interest
# See the pssibilities in tab$data_states
my_states = c("NC", "MN")

# Alternativelly, choose all states in the dataset
# Thus will retrieve data in tab$data_tables_states_combined
my_states_2 = "ALL"

# You also must provide the directory where the files will be dumped in.
my_output_dir = "data_test/fia"

# Start download!
# Will probably take a while...
fia::download_fia_tables(table_names           = my_table_names,
                         states                = my_states,
                         destination_dir       = my_output_dir,
                         list_available_tables = tab, # returned by `list_available_tables()`
                         table_format          = "zip",
                         overwrite             = TRUE)

## Trying to download REF_SPECIES.zip... May take a very long time!

## Trying to download MN_PLOT.zip... May take a very long time!

## Trying to download NC_PLOT.zip... May take a very long time!