A Procedure for Mapping and Monitoring Mountain Pine Beetle Red Attack Forest Damage Using Landsat Imagery

A Procedure for Mapping and Monitoring Mountain Pine Beetle Red Attack Forest Damage Using Landsat Imagery
Author:
Publisher:
Total Pages: 30
Release: 2006
Genre:
ISBN:

Remote sensing is a useful technology for detecting and mapping the red attack stage of a mountain pine beetle infestation. Provided appropriate imagery is selected to coincide with the manifestation of the red attack damage, the damage can be mapped in an accurate and timely fashion using Landsat Thematic Mapper or Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus imagery and change detection methods. This report describes a detailed procedure for using multiple dates of Landsat imagery to generate information products indicating the location and extent of mountain pine beetle red attack damage. The accuracy of this procedure is assessed and reported using more detailed forest health survey information at three sites in British Columbia. Also documented in this report is an optimal approach for Landsat scene selection, a summary of the level of effort required to apply the procedure described herein, and recommendations for potential improvements to the mapping procedure. Details on data acquisition, image pre-processing, image analysis, and accuracy assessment are included to facilitate the implementation for the mapping procedure in an operational context.

A Procedure for Mapping and Monitoring Mountain Pine Beetle Red Attack Forest Damage Using Landsat Imagery

A Procedure for Mapping and Monitoring Mountain Pine Beetle Red Attack Forest Damage Using Landsat Imagery
Author: Michael Albert Wulder
Publisher: Canadian Government Publishing
Total Pages: 30
Release: 2006
Genre: Artificial satellites in forestry
ISBN: 9780662432906

This study is part of a series of research papers that explore the biological, social, and economic aspects of British Columbia's mountain pine beetle epidemic. This report describes a detailed procedure for using multiple dates of Landsat imagery to generate information products indicating the location and extent of mountain pine beetle red attack damage. The accuracy of this procedure is assessed and reported using more detailed forest health survey information at three sites in British Columbia. Also documented in this report is an optimal approach for Landsat scene selection, a summary of the level of effort required to apply the procedure described herein, and recommendations for potential improvements to the mapping procedure. Details on data acquisition, image pre-processing, image analysis, and accuracy assessment are included to facilitate the implementation for the mapping procedure in an operational context.--Includes text from document.

Detecting and Mapping Mountain Pine Beetle Red-attack Damage with SPOT-5 10-m Multispectral Imagery

Detecting and Mapping Mountain Pine Beetle Red-attack Damage with SPOT-5 10-m Multispectral Imagery
Author: Joanne White
Publisher:
Total Pages: 30
Release: 2006
Genre: Nature
ISBN:

The mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae Hopkins) is the most destructive insect of mature pine forests in western North America. From a forest management perspective, estimates of the location and extent of mountain pine beetle red-attack are critical; however, the degree of precision required for these estimates varies according to the management objective under consideration and the nature of the mountain pine beetle infestation. This report describes a study to explore the potential of single-date SPOT multispectral imagery to detect and map mountain pine beetle red-attack damage in an area with relatively low infestation levels using an automated classification procedure. In doing so, issues unique to SPOT, and the potential offered by the higher spatial resolution of SPOT compared with Landsat, could be identified. The viability of SPOT as an alternative data source to Landsat could then be assessed.

Assessing the Accuracy of Mountain Pine Beetle Red Attack Damage Maps Generated from Satellite Remotely Sensed Data

Assessing the Accuracy of Mountain Pine Beetle Red Attack Damage Maps Generated from Satellite Remotely Sensed Data
Author: J. C. White
Publisher:
Total Pages: 3
Release: 2007-01-01
Genre: Mountain pine beetle
ISBN: 9780662465324

An accuracy assessment is considered the best way to demonstrate the effectiveness with which different data sources and methods may be used to map mountain pine beetle red attack damage from remotely sensed data. Simply reporting overall accuracy, however, does not provide sufficient context to evaluate the map product and may misconstrue the accuracy with which red attack damage is detected and mapped. This publication made several recommendations regarding accuracy assessment in the context of mountain pine beetle red attack detection and mapping.--Document.

Mapping Mountain Pine Beetle-attacked Ponderosa Pine from High-resolution Imagery

Mapping Mountain Pine Beetle-attacked Ponderosa Pine from High-resolution Imagery
Author:
Publisher:
Total Pages: 17
Release: 2015
Genre:
ISBN:

The mountain pine beetle (MPB) (Dendroctonus ponderosae) has killed millions of acres of pines throughout the western United States in recent years. Active control of the beetle has been hindered by the inability to detect infested trees prior to obvious visual signs. With sponsorship from the Forest Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture (USFS) Remote Sensing Steering Committee, the Remote Sensing Applications Center in collaboration with the Black Hills National Forest (NF), conducted a study to determine the feasibility of pre-visual detection of MPB-infested ponderosa pine by analyzing a time series of 26 high-resolution, 8-band, multispectral WorldView-2 (WV2) images of the Black Hills NF. Based on spectral and trend analyses of the time series data, the first sign of detection occurred around mid-March to April. Unfortunately, the newly attacked trees could not be detected early enough for the management goals of the Black Hills NF. Therefore, the emphasis of the project shifted to developing a semi-automated method to map the red-attack stage of the trees from high-resolution aerial photography and SPOT 6 imagery. The red-attack trees were mapped from the aerial photography using eCognition software across an area of approximately one million acres. In many areas, the results were exceptional, with very few errors; however, in areas of sparse or thinned forest, significant errors of omission and commission occurred. Despite the errors, the semi-automated process may still provide sufficient benefit to reduce the time and cost of mapping the trees as compared to traditional manual delineation methods.

Working Paper, Monitoring Tree-level Insect Population Dynamics with Multi-scale and Multi-source Remote Sensing

Working Paper, Monitoring Tree-level Insect Population Dynamics with Multi-scale and Multi-source Remote Sensing
Author: Michael A. Wulder
Publisher:
Total Pages: 42
Release: 2008
Genre: Nature
ISBN:

Long-term monitoring of the rate of change of mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae Hopkins) populations requires detailed tree-level information over large areas. This information is used to assess the status of an infestation (e.g., increasing, stable, or decreasing), and to select and evaluate mitigation approaches. In this research project, the authors develop and demonstrate a prototype monitoring system, which enables the extrapolation of tree-level estimates of beetle damage from field data to a larger study area using a double sampling approach, and multi-scale, multi-source, high spatial resolution remotely sensed data. The project study area encompasses over 6 million ha and is located at the leading edge of an ongoing mountain pine beetle epidemic along the provincial border between British Columbia and Alberta, within the Dawson Creek Timber Supply Area (TSA) of British Columbia and the Northwest Boreal Forest Management Unit in Alberta.--Document.