The Atlas maps are composed of several layers of which there are two broad categories: thematic and base layers. Find below a description of each of the map layers. The layer source is included in the metadata.
Thematic Map Layers
Forest Fire Hotspots, 2003
This layer shows the location of all forest fire hotspots detected to date in 2003. Each hotspot represents an area of 1 km² on the ground. This map is normally updated each day between 2 AM and 4AM. Source: Canadian Forest Service, Canadian Wildland Fire Information System.
Productive forest land depicts the area of timber productive forest divided by the area of each of the 194 Terrestrial Ecoregions of Canada. Timber productive forest refers to the almost 2.5 million square kilometres of forested land that is capable of producing timber, although not necessarily managed to do so.
Base map components are features that provide a geographic
context for the thematic data shown on Atlas of Canada maps.
These features include rivers, lakes, administrative boundaries,
populated places, roads and rail lines. All of the Atlas of
Canada base map components are available for immediate free
download in five scales and in a number of data exchange formats.
The 1:7 500 000 and the 1:1 000 000 scale data are the primary base
frameworks used for all Atlas of Canada 6th Edition online
maps. You can download Atlas of Canada data from this Web
page on GeoGratis.
Wild fires have a significant impact on vegetation dynamics. They are a major disturbance to the boreal ecosystem and contribute to the increase in trace gases that cause variations in climate.
The Canadian Wildland Fire Information System creates daily fire weather and fire behavior maps year-round and hot spot maps throughout the forest fire season, generally between May and September.
The Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre (CIFFC) provides operational fire-control services, as well as management and information services to its Member Agencies.
