Abstract
There are several environmental variables that may be influential to the spatial distribution of forest vegetation. To create a map of forest vegetation zone over southern part of Korean Peninsula, digital map layers were produced for each of environmental variables that include topography, geographic locations, and climate. In addition, an extensive set of field survey data was collected at relatively undisturbed forests and they were introduced into the GIS database with exact coordinates of survey sites. Preliminary statistical analysis on the survey data showed that the environmental variables were significantly different among the previously defined five forest vegetation zones. Classification of the six layers of digital map representing environmental variables was carried out by a supervised classifier using the training statistics from field survey data and by a clustering algorithm. Although the maps from two classifiers were somewhat different due to the classification procedure applied, they showed overall patterns of vertical and horizontal distribution of forest zones. considering the spatial contents of many ecological studies, GIS can be used as an important tool to manage and analyze spatial data. This study discusses more about the generation of digital map and the analysis procedure rather than the outcome map of forest vegetation zone.