Band Vegetation Indices Research Articles

Enhanced Blue Band Vegetation Index (The Re-Modified Anthocyanin Reflectance Index (RMARI)) for Accurate Farmland Shelterbelt Extraction

Farmland shelterbelts are aimed at farmland protection and productivity improvement, environmental protection and ecological balance, as well as land use planning and management. Farmland shelterbelts play a vital role in determining the structural integrity and overall effectiveness of farmland, and assessing the dynamic changes within these protective forests accurately and swiftly is essential to maintaining their protective functions as well as for policy formulation and effectiveness evaluation in relevant departments. Traditional methods for extracting farmland shelterbelt information have faced significant challenges due to the large workload required and the inconsistencies in the accuracy of existing methods. For example, the existing vegetation index extraction methods often have significant errors, which remain unresolved. Therefore, developing a more efficient extraction method with greater accuracy is imperative. This study focused on Youyi Farm in Heilongjiang Province, China, utilizing satellite data with spatial resolutions ranging from 0.8 m (GF-7) to 30 m (Landsat). By taking into account the growth cycles of farmland shelterbelts and variations in crop types, the optimal temporal window for extraction is identified based on phenological analysis. The study introduced a new index—the Re-Modified Anthocyanin Reflectance Index (RMARI)—which is an improvement on existing vegetation indexes, such as the NDVI and the improved original ARI. Both the accuracy and extraction results showed significant improvements, and the feasibility of the RMARI was confirmed. The study proposed four extraction schemes for farmland shelterbelts: (1) spectral feature extraction, (2) extraction using vegetation indexes, (3) random forest extraction, and (4) RF combined with characteristic index bands. The extraction process was implemented on the GEE platform, and results from different spatial resolutions were compared. Results showed that (1) the bare soil period in May is the optimal time period for extracting farmland shelterbelts; (2) the RF method combined with characteristic index bands produces the best extraction results, effectively distinguishing shelterbelts from other land features; (3) the RMARI reduces background noise more effectively than the NDVI and ARI, resulting in more comprehensive extraction outcomes; and (4) among the satellite images analyzed—GF-7, Planet, Sentinel-2, and Landsat OLI 8—GF-7 achieves the highest extraction accuracy (with a Kappa coefficient of 0.95 and an OA of 0.97), providing the most detailed textural information. However, comprehensive analysis suggests that Sentinel-2 is more suitable for large-scale farmland shelterbelt information extraction. This study provides new approaches and technical support for periodic dynamic forestry surveys, providing valuable reference points for agricultural ecological research.

Leveraging Google Earth Engine to estimate foliar C: N ratio in an African savannah rangeland using Sentinel 2 data

Rangelands are important fodder for livestock and wildlife, and provide a range of ecosystem services to the environment. Foliar nutrients such as nitrogen, carbon, and plant pigments such as chlorophyll can be used as indicators of rangeland stress, and play a vital role in determining their health and productivity. The C:N ratio is a key factor in regulating nutrient utilization efficiency and productivity in plants. Understanding the C:N ratio in rangelands could therefore help herders understand the nutrient limitations, and herbivores distribution to facilitate strategic grazing plans and management. Therefore, there is a need for spatially accurate and up-to-date information on C:N ratio to understand and monitor rangeland health for proactive rangeland management. Remote sensing approaches are spatially explicit, cost-effective, and efficient in monitoring foliar nutrient ratio in rangelands. Whereas, the new generation and advanced Sentinel 2 multispectral sensor has the potential to monitor vegetation health, the strength of its spectral settings in relation to predicting the C:N ratio in rangelands remains largely unexplored. Advanced and freely available Sentinel 2 multispectral sensor (MSI) with specialized red edge bands offer unprecedented opportunities in mapping and monitoring rangeland nutrients. Hence, this study examined the prospect of combined Sentinel-2 (MSI) spectral bands and vegetation indices, and the random forest algorithm to map the C: N ratio within a rangeland. To determine the C:N ratio distribution, the Random Forest and the Boruta variable selection were employed to assess the performance of the combined Sentinel 2 spectral bands and vegetation indices models. Results show an estimated accuracy R2 of 81 and 74, with RMSE of 2.38 and 2.68 for calibration and validation datasets of the C:N ratio model established by combining the spectral bands and vegetation indices. The random forest variable selection model indicates that the red edge bands, and near-infrared were the most valuable in predicting the C:N ratio. The red edge and near-infrared (Inverted Red-edge Chlorophyll Index) and near-infrared and red band (Enhanced Vegetation Index) vegetation indices were important predictor variables for estimating the C:N ratio. This study demonstrates the prospects and value of mapping the geographic distribution of the C:N ratio in rangelands using high spatial resolution Sentinel 2 MSI. This information will not only help determine nutrient deficiencies in rangelands but will also provide informed recommendation in mitigating landscape degeneration to allow for rangeland regeneration.

Monitoring Key Wheat Growth Variables by Integrating Phenology and UAV Multispectral Imagery Data into Random Forest Model

Rapidly developing remote sensing techniques are shedding new light on large-scale crop growth status monitoring, especially in recent applications of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Many inversion models have been built to estimate crop growth variables. However, the present methods focused on building models for each single crop stage, and the features generally used in the models are vegetation indices (VI) or joint VI with data derived from UAV-based sensors (e.g., texture, RGB color information, or canopy height). It is obvious these models are either limited to a single stage or have an unstable performance across stages. To address these issues, this study selected four key wheat growth parameters for inversion: above-ground biomass (AGB), plant nitrogen accumulation (PNA) and concentration (PNC), and the nitrogen nutrition index (NNI). Crop data and multispectral data were acquired in five wheat growth stages. Then, the band reflectance and VI were obtained from multispectral data, along with the five stages that were recorded as phenology indicators (PIs) according to the stage of Zadok’s scale. These three types of data formed six combinations (C1–C6): C1 used all of the band reflectances, C2 used all VIs, C3 used bands and VIs, C4 used bands and PIs, C5 used VIs and PIs, and C6 used bands, Vis, and PIs. Some of the combinations were integrated with PIs to verify if PIs can improve the model accuracy. Random forest (RF) was used to build models with combinations of different parameters and evaluate the feature importance. The results showed that all models of different combinations have good performance in the modeling of crop parameters, such as R2 from 0.6 to 0.79 and NRMSE from 10.51 to 15.83%. Then, the model was optimized to understand the importance of PIs. The results showed that the combinations that integrated PIs showed better estimations and the potential of using PIs to minimize features while still achieving good predictions. Finally, the varied model results were evaluated to analyze their performances in different stages or fertilizer treatments. The results showed the models have good performances at different stages or treatments (R2 > 0.6). This paper provides a reference for monitoring and estimating wheat growth parameters based on UAV multispectral imagery and phenology information.

Application of an innovative narrow band vegetation index to corn leaves to explore the characteristics of corn spectra under Cu2+ stress

ABSTRACT In this study, an innovative narrow band vegetation index (INBVI) was proposed to explore the sensitive regions of corn leaves spectra under copper stress. In 2016, the spectra and Cu2+ contents of corn leaves under different copper stress concentrations were measured by designing corn stress experiments with different copper gradients. Firstly, we divided the spectra of corn leaves into 11 subintervals, and chose the spectral reflectance which corresponded to the middle wavelength of each subinterval to build INBVI. Then, the Pearson correlation coefficient (r) and Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) were calculated, and we analysed correlation of the INBVI and Cu2+ contents in corn leaves. What’s more, we compared it with the three conventional vegetation indexes of Water Band Index (WBI), Modified Chlorophyll Absorption Ratio Index (MCARI) and Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI). Finally, the spectra of corn leaves obtained under the same experimental conditions in other year were used to verify the stability and effectiveness of INBVI. The results showed that the four subintervals of Green peak, Red edge, Near valley and Near peak A were sensitive intervals, because the absolute value of r exceeded .9, and the RMSE values were lower than other subintervals and the three conventional vegetation indexes. We verified the above results and found the sensitive intervals were Green peak, Red edge, Near valley and Near peak A, which were consistent with the sensitive subintervals obtained from the experiment data in 2016, and confirmed the effectiveness and stability of INBVI. The INBVI proposed in this paper can be used as a method to monitor copper pollution in corn leaves, and provide some theoretical support for the research of heavy metal pollution in other crops.

Modeling solar-induced fluorescence of forest with heterogeneous distribution of damaged foliage by extending the stochastic radiative transfer theory

Solar Induced chlorophyll Fluorescence (SIF) has been used as a novel proxy of photosynthetic activity, which carries information about plant physiological state from the remote sensing observations. It is of great interest and potential to use SIF to detect forest stresses, but the approach requires accurate modeling of the SIF emission within stressed forests. However, the existing radiative transfer approaches of SIF generally ignore the within-crown heterogeneity caused by pests. To account for within-canopy scattering with both high accuracy and efficiency, FluorESRT was proposed as a new model for simulating the SIF of forests with heterogeneous distribution of damaged foliage, which was the synergy of the SIF radiative transfer and the Stochastic Radiative Transfer (SRT) model for forest with vertical distribution of damage. The performance of FluorESRT for both homogeneous and heterogeneous cases were well validated not only by the one-dimensional (1D) model SCOPE but also by the three-dimensional (3D) model DART. As an analytically simple approach, FluorESRT can evaluate the sensitivity of canopy SIF and apparent reflectance to the level of pest damage. The impact of structural properties of damaged foliage on canopy fluorescence, as well as the response of hyperspectral signals on the pest damage was analyzed. According to our study, hyperspectral vegetation indices with the consideration of SIF showed higher sensitivity to pest damage in the early stage when the response of broad band vegetation indices was hardly detectable. The results indicated that the potential of FluorESRT to simulate SIF and hyperspectral apparent reflectance should play a critical role in early monitoring of pest damage.

Research on Monitoring Topping Time of Cotton Based on AdaBoost+Decision Tree

Topping is an important part in cotton field management, the spraying time has a great impact on cotton quality. In agricultural production, the strategy of timing the cotton topping mainly relies on manual inspections and experience, which is lack of efficiency and science. To solve the problem, this paper uses a drone equipped with a multispectral camera to collect the multispectral information of the cotton canopy of 12 days which includes before and after the topping operation in Shihezi. At the same time, the information of cotton plant height, the number of fruiting branches, and flower buds are collected. Compare multiple band combinations and vegetation index; the combined data of 550 + 730 + 790 nm band is selected as the model input. AdaBoost + decision tree method is proposed as a fitting model, the fitting results show that the coefficient of determination (R2) between multispectrum and cotton plant height is 0.96, and the average prediction error (RMSEP) is 0.40 cm, the coefficient of determination (R2) between multispectrum information and the fruiting branches is 0.97, the prediction mean error (RMSEP) is 0.54, and the correlation determination (R2) with the flower buds is 0.84, and the prediction mean error is (RMSEP) 0.49. The output data of the fitting model is used as the input of the topping time discriminant model, and the discriminant model can obtain an accuracy of 94.03%. The method in this paper can effectively monitor the growth status of cotton in the topping time and provide a technical path to scientifically determine the cotton topping time.

Estimation of Paddy Rice Nitrogen Content and Accumulation Both at Leaf and Plant Levels from UAV Hyperspectral Imagery

Remote sensing-based mapping of crop nitrogen (N) status is beneficial for precision N management over large geographic regions. Both leaf/canopy level nitrogen content and accumulation are valuable for crop nutrient diagnosis. However, previous studies mainly focused on leaf nitrogen content (LNC) estimation. The effects of growth stages on the modeling accuracy have not been widely discussed. This study aimed to estimate different paddy rice N traits—LNC, plant nitrogen content (PNC), leaf nitrogen accumulation (LNA) and plant nitrogen accumulation (PNA)—from unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-based hyperspectral images. Additionally, the effects of the growth stage were evaluated. Univariate regression models on vegetation indices (VIs), the traditional multivariate calibration method, partial least squares regression (PLSR) and modern machine learning (ML) methods, including artificial neural network (ANN), random forest (RF), and support vector machine (SVM), were evaluated both over the whole growing season and in each single growth stage (including the tillering, jointing, booting and heading growth stages). The results indicate that the correlation between the four nitrogen traits and the other three biochemical traits—leaf chlorophyll content, canopy chlorophyll content and aboveground biomass—are affected by the growth stage. Within a single growth stage, the performance of selected VIs is relatively constant. For the full-growth-stage models, the performance of the VI-based models is more diverse. For the full-growth-stage models, the transformed chlorophyll absorption in the reflectance index/optimized soil-adjusted vegetation index (TCARI/OSAVI) performs best for LNC, PNC and PNA estimation, while the three band vegetation index (TBVITian) performs best for LNA estimation. There are no obvious patterns regarding which method performs the best of the PLSR, ANN, RF and SVM in either the growth-stage-specific or full-growth-stage models. For the growth-stage-specific models, a lower mean relative error (MRE) and higher R2 can be acquired at the tillering and jointing growth stages. The PLSR and ML methods yield obviously better estimation accuracy for the full-growth-stage models than the VI-based models. For the growth-stage-specific models, the performance of VI-based models seems optimal and cannot be obviously surpassed. These results suggest that building linear regression models on VIs for paddy rice nitrogen traits estimation is still a reasonable choice when only a single growth stage is involved. However, when multiple growth stages are involved or missing the phenology information, using PLSR or ML methods is a better option.

Improved Estimation of Aboveground Biomass of Disturbed Grassland through Including Bare Ground and Grazing Intensity

Accurate approaches to aboveground biomass (AGB) estimation are required to support appraisal of the effectiveness of land use measures, which seek to protect grazing-adapted grasslands atop the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP). This methodological study assesses the effectiveness of one commonly used visible band vegetation index, Red Green Blue Vegetation Index (RGBVI), obtained from unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), in estimating AGB timely and accurately at the local scale, seeking to improve the estimation accuracy by taking into account in situ collected information on disturbed grassland. Particular emphasis is placed upon the mapping and quantification of areas disturbed by grazing (simulated via mowing) and plateau pika (Ochotona curzoniae) that have led to the emergence of bare ground. The initial model involving only RGBVI performed poorly in AGB estimation by underestimating high AGB by around 10% and overestimating low AGB by about 10%. The estimation model was modified by the mowing intensity ratio and bare ground metrics. The former almost doubled the estimation accuracy from R2 = 0.44 to 0.81. However, this modification caused the bare ground AGB to be overestimated by about 38 and 19 g m−2 for 2018 and 2019, respectively. Although further modification of the model by bare ground metrics improved the accuracy slightly to 0.88, it markedly reduced the overestimation of low AGB values. It is recommended that grazing intensity be incorporated into the micro-scale estimation of AGB, together with the bare ground modification metrics, especially for severely disturbed meadows with a sizable portion of bare ground.

Estimation of Multi-Species Leaf Area Index Based on Chinese GF-1 Satellite Data Using Look-Up Table and Gaussian Process Regression Methods

Leaf area index (LAI) is an important biophysical parameter, which can be effectively applied in the estimation of vegetation growth status. At present, amounts of studies just focused on the LAI estimation of a single plant type, while plant types are usually mixed rather than single distribution. In this study, the suitability of GF-1 data for multi-species LAI estimation was evaluated by using Gaussian process regression (GPR), and a look-up table (LUT) combined with a PROSAIL radiative transfer model. Then, the performance of the LUT and GPR for multi-species LAI estimation was analyzed in term of 15 different band combinations and 10 published vegetation indices (VIs). Lastly, the effect of the different band combinations and published VIs on the accuracy of LAI estimation was discussed. The results indicated that GF-1 data exhibited a good potential for multi-species LAI retrieval. Then, GPR exhibited better performance than that of LUT for multi-species LAI estimation. What is more, modified soil adjusted vegetation index (MSAVI) was selected based on the GPR algorithm for multi-species LAI estimation with a lower root mean squared error (RMSE = 0.6448 m2/m2) compared to other band combinations and VIs. Then, this study can provide guidance for multi-species LAI estimation.

Improvement of mapping vegetation cover for arid and semiarid areas using a local nonlinear modelling method and landsat images

Accurately estimating and mapping vegetation cover for monitoring land degradation and desertification of arid and semiarid areas using remotely sensed images is promising but challenging in remote, sparsely vegetated and large areas. In this study, a novel method – geographically weighted logistic regression (GWLR – integrating geographically weighted regression (GWR) and a logistic model) was proposed to improve vegetation cover mapping of Kangbao County, Hebei of China using Landsat 8 image and field data. Additionally, a new method to determine the bandwidth of GWLR is presented. Using cross-validation, GWLR was compared with a globally linear stepwise regression (LSR), a local linear modelling method GWR and a nonparametric method, k-nearest neighbours (kNN) with varying numbers of nearest plots. Results demonstrated (1) the red and near infrared relevant band ratios and vegetation indices significantly improved mapping; (2) the GWLR, GWR and kNN methods led to more accurate predictions than LSR; (3) GWLR reduced overestimations and underestimations compared with LSR, kNN and GWR, and also eliminated negative and very large estimates caused by GWR and LSR; and (4) The maximum distance of spatial autocorrelation could be used to determine the bandwidth for GWLR. Overall, GWLR proved more promising for mapping vegetation cover of arid and semiarid areas.

New research methods for vegetation information extraction based on visible light remote sensing images from an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)

Currently, many remote sensing images of the vegetation index being used have disadvantages, because of high cost, long cycles, and low resolution. Thus, it is difficult to extract and analyse vegetation information in the field. A vegetation index based on visible light images from an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) has the advantages of fast image acquisition and high ground resolution, which is superior to traditional remote sensing. However, the vegetation coverage in arid and semi-arid areas is low, and the soil background has a great impact on the common visible vegetation index. The real-time extraction and analysis of the index vegetation information can easily result in big errors. Therefore, according to the construction principle of the green-red vegetation index (GRVI) and modified green-red vegetation index (MGRVI), a new green-red vegetation index (NGRVI) is proposed in this study. First, the newly constructed index and several published indices are used to extract visible light images and generate greyscale images for each of the visible light vegetation indices. Then, the threshold of vegetation and non-vegetation pixel classification is established according to the method of iterative threshold, and the optimal threshold is used to extract the vegetation information from the greyscale images of each of the visible light vegetation indices. Finally, the accuracy difference in vegetation information extraction between the newly constructed and several published indices is compared. The results show that the precision of vegetation information extraction by NGRVI is higher than that of other visible light band vegetation indices; the kappa coefficient is 0.82, and the classification accuracy reaches near-complete consistency. To verify the accuracy of the NGRVI, one image from the same period was selected, and the vegetation information was extracted using the same method. The NGRVI based on UAV visible light images can accurately extract the vegetation information in arid and semi-arid areas, and the extraction accuracy can reach more than 90%. To summarize, NGRVI can accurately and effectively reflect the vegetation information in arid and semi-arid areas and become an important technical means for retrieving biological and physical parameters using visible light images.

Retrieval of Maize Leaf Area Index Using Hyperspectral and Multispectral Data

Field spectra acquired from a handheld spectroradiometer and Sentinel-2 images spectra were used to investigate the applicability of hyperspectral and multispectral data in retrieving the maize leaf area index in low-input crop systems, with high spatial and intra-annual variability, and low yield, in southern Mozambique, during three years. Seventeen vegetation indices, comprising two and three band indices, and nine machine learning regression algorithms (MLRA) were tested for the statistical approach while five cost functions were tested in the look-up-table (LUT) inversion approach. The three band vegetation indices were selected, specifically the modified difference index (mDId: 725; 715; 565) for the hyperspectral dataset and the modified simple ratio (mSRc: 740; 705; 865) for the multispectral dataset of field spectra and the three band spectral index (TBSIb: 665; 865; 783) for the Sentinel-2 dataset. The relevant vector machine was the selected MLRA for the two datasets of field spectra (multispectral and hyperspectral) while the support vector machine was selected for the Sentinel-2 data. When using the LUT inversion technique, the minimum contrast estimation and the Bhattacharyya divergence cost functions were the best performing. The vegetation indices outperformed the other two approaches, with the TBSIb as the most accurate index (RMSE = 0.35). At the field scale, spectral data from Sentinel-2 can accurately retrieve the maize leaf area index in the study area.

Remote estimation of crop canopy parameters by statistical regression algorithms for winter rapeseed using Sentinel-2 multispectral images

Еstimation of crop canopy parameters is important task for remote sensing monitoring of agriculture and constructing strategies for within-field management. The main objective of this study is to evaluate the retrieval from Sentinel-2 images by parametric and non-parametric statistical models several crop canopy parameters for monitoring before winter and after winter rapeseed crop in real farming conditions of North East Bulgaria. For the calibration of the models in-situ data from three field campaigns is used. For most of the studied parameters models with good accuracy were identified, except for aboveground fresh biomass. The best identified model for vegetation fraction (RMSEcv=0.14%) and plant density (RMSEcv=9 nb/m2) were parametric models with three band vegetation index (3BSI-Tian) and linear fitting function for the first, three band vegetation index (3BSI-Verreslt) and polynomial for the second parameter. For aboveground dry biomass (RMSEcv=52 g/m²), mean plant height (RMSEcv=4cm) and nitrogen concentration in fresh biomass (RMSEcv=2%) the best models were non-parametric, Gaussian Processes Regression for the first parameter and Variational Heteroscedastic variant of the Gaussian Processes Regression for the other two.

Image Classification Using RapidEye Data: Integration of Spectral and Textual Features in a Random Forest Classifier

Information on crop types derived from remotely sensed images provides valuable input for many applications such as crop growth modeling and yield forecasting. In this paper, a random forest (RF) classifier was used for crop classification using multispectral RapidEye imagery over two study sites, one in north-eastern China and one in eastern Ontario, Canada. Both vegetation indices (VIs) and textural features were derived from the RapidEye imagery and used for classification. A total of 20 VIs, categorized into two groups with and without the red edge (RE) band in an index, were calculated. A total of eight types of textural features were derived using four different window sizes from both the RE and the near-infrared bands. To reduce redundancies among the VIs and textural features, feature selection using the principal component analysis, correlation analysis, and stepwise discriminant analysis was performed. Results showed that the overall classification accuracy was improved by ∼7% when the RE indices were combined with the five spectral bands in classification, as compared with that using the five bands alone. When textural information was included, the overall classification accuracy increased by ∼6% compared with that using the band reflectance alone. Furthermore, when all the features (band reflectance, VIs, and texture) were used, the overall classification accuracy increased by ∼12% compared with that using only the band reflectance. The RF importance measures showed that the RE reflectance was important for classification, as indicated by the high importance for the triangular vegetation index, transformed chlorophyll absorption in reflectance index, and green-rededge normalized difference vegetation index. The gray-level co-occurrence matrix mean is the most useful for classification among the textural features. The study provides a means to feature extraction and selection for crop classification from remote sensing imagery.

Maximizing the relationship of yield to site-specific management zones with object-oriented segmentation of hyperspectral images

Quick and low cost delineation of site-specific management zones (SSMZ) would improve applications of precision agriculture. In this study, a new method for delineating SSMZ using object-oriented segmentation of airborne imagery was demonstrated. Three remote sensing domains—spectral, spatial, and temporal- are exploited to improve the SSMZ relationship to yield. Common vegetation indices (VI), and first and second derivatives ([Formula: see text], [Formula: see text]) from twelve airborne hyperspectral images of a cotton field for one season [Formula: see text] were used as input layers for object-oriented segmentation. The optimal combination of VI, SSMZ size and crop phenological stage were used as input variables for SSMZ delineation, determined by maximizing the correlation to segmented yield monitor maps. Combining narrow band vegetation indices and object-oriented segmentation provided higher correlation between VI and yield at SSMZ scale than that at pixel scale by reducing multi-resource data noise. VI performance varied during the cotton growing season, providing better SSMZ delineation at the beginning and middle of the season (days after planting (DAP) 66–143).The optimal scale determined for SSMZ delineation was approximately 240 polygons for the study field, but the method also provided flexibility enabling the setting of practical scales for a given field. For a defined scale, the optimal single phenological stage for the study field was near July 11 (DAP 87) early in the growing season. SSMZs determined from multispectral VIs at a single stage were also satisfactory; compared to hyperspectral indices, temporal resolution of multi-spectral data seems more important for SSMZ delineation.

A new narrow band vegetation index for characterizing the degree of vegetation stress due to copper: the copper stress vegetation index (CSVI)

ABSTRACTThis study proposed a new narrow band index to characterize the Cu (Copper) stress degree on vegetation (Copper Stress Vegetation Index, CSVI). Firstly, the spectral reflectance and biochemical data of wheat, pea, locust and ash were analysed using Pearson correlation coefficient (r) to select wavelengths sensitive to Cu stress. The calculated Pearson correlation coefficients suggested that the reflectance near 550 nm and 700 nm correlated positively with Cu contents in leaves and solutions, and negative correlation was present in the range of 800–900 nm. Secondly, the selected wavelengths of 550 nm, 700 nm, and 850 nm were used to establish CSVI, and it was compared with existing popular vegetation indices (VIs) related to heavy metal stress (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), Red-Edge Position (REP), Difference Vegetation Index (DVI), Photochemical Reflectance Index (PRI)) by calculating Pearson correlation coefficient between VIs and Cu contents in leaves and solutions. Thirdly, verifications of CSVI on other vegetations were conducted, and the performance of CSVI was also compared with that of NDVI, REP, DVI, and PRI. The results suggested that CSVI showed significant correlation with Cu stress degree, and the correlation of CSVI was much stronger than that of other VIs for all the tested vegetations. The proposed CSVI characterizes the Cu stress degree on vegetation with advantages of better effectiveness, straightforward calculation, and robustness for different vegetations. This study focused on the spectral reflectance at the leaf scale, so it is expected that future work extends it to canopy scale and mixed-pixel scale.

Quantification of dead vegetation fraction in mixed pastures using AisaFENIX imaging spectroscopy data

New Zealand farming relies heavily on grazed pasture for feeding livestock; therefore it is important to provide high quality palatable grass in order to maintain profitable and sustainable grassland management. The presence of non-photosynthetic vegetation (NPV) such as dead vegetation in pastures severely limits the quality and productivity of pastures. Quantifying the fraction of dead vegetation in mixed pastures is a great challenge even with remote sensing approaches. In this study, a high spatial resolution with pixel resolution of 1m and spectral resolution of 3.5–5.6nm imaging spectroscopy data from AisaFENIX (380–2500nm) was used to assess the fraction of dead vegetation component in mixed pastures on a hill country farm in New Zealand. We used different methods to retrieve dead vegetation fraction from the spectra; narrow band vegetation indices, full spectrum based partial least squares (PLS) regression and feature selection based PLS regression. Among all approaches, feature selection based PLS model exhibited better performance in terms of prediction accuracy (R2CV=0.73, RMSECV=6.05, RPDCV=2.25). The results were consistent with validation data, and also performed well on the external test data (R2=0.62, RMSE=8.06, RPD=2.06). In addition, statistical tests were conducted to ascertain the effect of topographical variables such as slope and aspect on the accumulation of the dead vegetation fraction. Steep slopes (>25°) had a significantly (p<0.05) higher amount of dead vegetation. In contrast, aspect showed non-significant impact on dead vegetation accumulation. The results from the study indicate that AisaFENIX imaging spectroscopy data could be a useful tool for mapping the dead vegetation fraction accurately.

Relationship of Hyperspectral Reflectance Indices with Leaf N and P Concentration, Dry Matter Accumulation and Grain Yield of Wheat

A field experiment was conducted on wheat during rabi season of year 2010–2011 and 2011–2012 at IARI, New Delhi to study the reflectance response of wheat to the nutrient omissions and identify the appropriate indices for assessing the nutrient deficiencies. Treatments comprised omission of N, P, K, S and Zn, 50% omission of N, P, and K, absolute control and optimum dose of nutrition (150–26.4–50–15–3 kg/ha N–P–K–S–Zn). The R2 were significant and higher for the hyperspectral indices than the broad band vegetation indices. GMI-I, RI-2 dB and RI-3d, GNDVI, VOGa, VOGb, VOGc, ND705, PRI, PSNDc and REIP had higher R2 (>0.61) for the leaf N concentration. The hyperspectral indices having highly significant correlation with leaf P concentration were PSSRc, GMI-1, ZM, RI-half, VOGa, VOGb, VOGc, mSR and REIP. Among the indices analysed PSSRc, GMI-I, VOGa, RI-2 dB, RI-3 dB, GNDVI, VOGb, VOGc and ND705 had almost a similar degree of relationship with DM accumulation with R2 values ranging from 0.70 to 0.73. However, REIP displayed a higher degree of relationship with leaf N concentration, drymatter accumulation and grain yield as indicated by R2 of 0.85, 0.81 and 0.95 (P = ≤0.01), respectively. It can be concluded from the study that among the hyperspectral indices REIP had a highly significant relationship with leaf N concentration, DM accumulation and grain yield. However, for leaf P concentration several hyperspectral indices viz PSSRc, GMI-1, ZM, RI-half, VOGa, VOGb, VOGc, mSR had though significant but almost similar R2 values.

Retrieval of leaf area index in different plant species using thermal hyperspectral data

Leaf area index (LAI) is an important variable of terrestrial ecosystems because it is strongly correlated with many ecosystem processes (e.g., water balance and evapotranspiration) and directly related to the plant energy balance and gas exchanges. Although LAI has been accurately predicted using visible and short-wave infrared hyperspectral data (0.3–2.5μm), LAI estimation using thermal infrared (TIR, 8–14μm) measurements has not yet been addressed. The novel approach of this study is to evaluate the retrieval of LAI using TIR hyperspectral data. The leaf area indices were destructively acquired for four plant species: Azalea japonica, Buxussempervirens, Euonymus japonicus, and Ficus benjamina. Canopy emissivity spectral measurements were obtained under controlled laboratory conditions using a MIDAC (M4401-F) spectrometer. The LAI retrieval was assessed using a partial least squares regression (PLSR), artificial neural networks (ANNs), and narrow band indices calculated from all possible combinations of waveband pairs for three vegetation indices including simple difference, simple ratio, and normalized difference. ANNs retrieved LAI more accurately than PLSR and vegetation indices (0.67<R2<0.95 versus 11.54%<RMSEcv<31.23%). The accuracy of LAI retrieval did not differ significantly between the vegetation indices. The results revealed that wavebands from the 8–12μm region contain relevant information for LAI estimation, irrespective of the chosen vegetation index. Moreover, they demonstrated that LAI may be successfully predicted from TIR hyperspectral data, even for higher values of LAI (LAI⩾5.5). The study showed the significance of using PLSR and ANNs as multivariate methods compared to the univariate technique (e.g., narrow band vegetation indices) when hyperspectral thermal data is utilized. We thus demonstrated for the first time the potential of hyperspectral thermal data to accurately retrieve LAI.

THE COMBINATION OF UAV SURVEY AND LANDSAT IMAGERY FOR MONITORING OF CROP VIGOR IN PRECISION AGRICULTURE

Abstract. Mapping of the with-in field variability of crop vigor has a long tradition with a success rate ranging from medium to high depending on the local conditions of the study. Information about the development of agronomical relevant crop parameters, such as above-ground biomass and crop nutritional status, provides high reliability for yield estimation and recommendation for variable rate application of fertilizers. The aim of this study was to utilize unmanned and satellite multispectral imaging for estimation of basic crop parameters during the growing season. The experimental part of work was carried out in 2014 at the winter wheat field with an area of 69 ha located in the South Moravia region of the Czech Republic. An UAV imaging was done in April 2014 using Sensefly eBee, which was equipped by visible and near infrared (red edge) multispectral cameras. For ground truth calibration the spectral signatures were measured on 20 sites using portable spectroradiometer ASD Handheld 2 and simultaneously plant samples were taken at BBCH 32 (April 2014) and BBCH 59 (Mai 2014) for estimation of above-ground biomass and nitrogen content. The UAV survey was later extended by selected cloud-free Landsat 8 OLI satellite imagery, downloaded from USGS web application Earth Explorer. After standard pre-processing procedures, a set of vegetation indices was calculated from remotely and ground sensed data. As the next step, a correlation analysis was computed among crop vigor parameters and vegetation indices. Both, amount of above-ground biomass and nitrogen content were highly correlated (r &gt; 0.85) with ground spectrometric measurement by ASD Handheld 2 in BBCH 32, especially for narrow band vegetation indices (e.g. Red Edge Inflection Point). UAV and Landsat broadband vegetation indices varied in range of r = 0.5 – 0.7, highest values of the correlation coefficients were obtained for crop biomass by using GNDVI. In all cases results from BBCH 59 vegetation stage showed lower relationship to vegetation indices. Total amount of aboveground biomass was identified as the most important factor influencing the values of vegetation indices. Based on the results can be assumed that UAV and satellite monitoring provide reliable information about crop parameters for site specific crop management. The main difference of their utilization is coming from their specification and technical limits. Satellite survey can be used for periodic monitoring of crops as the indicator of their spatial heterogeneity within fields, but with low resolution (30 m per pixel for OLI). On the other hand UAV represents a special campaign aimed on the mapping of high-detailed spatial inputs for site specific crop management and variable rate application of fertilizers.