Outcomes & Impacts

Ground-based vegetation monitoring presents some practical challenges to natural resource managers tasked with assessing vegetation dynamics across large areas through time. Information obtained from ground-based techniques can be enhanced through frequent, synoptic observations made from satellite sensors. Since 1989, the USGS/EROS Data Center (EDC) has been deriving an index of vegetation greenness from 1km satellite imagery commonly used in phenology studies, the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI). Through NASA/Raytheon sponsorship, the University of Arizona has partnered with natural resource managers to make these data operationally accessible online. The resulting RangeView website empowers a user to zoom in anywhere in the conterminous U.S., northern Mexico and southern Canada, and run a time series animation of NDVI for any sequence from 1989 to the current period. It also permits side-by-side comparisons of different periods and relative greenness products (e.g. difference from average). Recent advancements include a new sensor which includes images of 250m resolution since 2001 which RangeView has been able to provide on-line for the southwestern U.S.

Outcomes and Impacts

RangeView began in 2002 as a visualization aid to natural resource managers concerned with vegetation monitoring. With the development of GeoDIVA, 120 natural resource managers now use RangeView decision support tools to monitor vegetation trends and plan for future management every day.

Assessing Drought Loss

"Percent of Loss" tends to be assessed by USDA's Farm Service Agency FSA as one rate for an entire county, though optimally assessments would account for climate and vegetation variability within counties. Extension Agent Boyd Kitchen (Uintah Co. Utah) reports RangeView decision tools led decision makers to revisit a county-wide ì65% of lossî estimate, ruling as much as 85% for ranchers hit hard in certain parts of the county.

Collaborative vs. Contentious Decision Making

Extremely dry conditions have resulted in serious discussions about rangeland stocking rates and wildlife habitat across the western U.S. RangeView has added a landscape-level vegetation monitoring component to the discussion, helping address the high spatial and temporal variability in rainfall -- something rain gage data for specific points cannot capture. RangeView adds a diminsion which agency personnel, ranchers and wildlife managers can use along with ground-based monitoring.

The potential impacts are great. Range scientists, using the Arizona example, feel that improved monitoring capabilities provided by RangeView decision support tools may lead to some major savings. They suggest that half of Arizona ranchers (750 allotments with reduced/redirected monitoring activities over 10 days each year, at $150 per day) using this technology could lead to annual savings of $1,125,000. Among government agencies, costs savings estimates are $750,000 per year (5 agencies could reduce/redirect monitoring activities for a total of 5,000 person days at $150 per day).

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