Estimation of forest development stage and crown closure using different classification methods and satellite images: A case study from Turkey

Abstract

The objective of this study is to estimate stand development stages (SDS) and stand crown closures (SCC) of forest using different classification methods (maximum likelihood, support vector machine: linear, polynomial, radial and sigmoid kernel functions and artificial neural network) based on satellite imagery of different resolution (Landsat 7 ETM+ and IKONOS). The results showed that SDS and SCC were estimated with Landsat 7 ETM+ image using the artificial neural network with a 0.83 and 0.78 kappa statistic value, and 92.57 and 89.77% overall accuracy assessments, respectively. On the other hand, SDS and SCC were predicted with IKONOS image using support vector machine (polynomial) method with a 0.94 and 0.88 kappa statistic value, and 95.95 and 91.17% overall accuracy assessments, respectively. Our results demonstrated that IKONOS satellite image and support vector machine (polynomial) method produced a better estimation of SDS and SCC as compared to Landsat 7 ETM+ and other supervised classification methods used in this study.