Vegetative analysis of center
section of project study area
in the area growing back? The answers
would come with time. However, after
several years, the land became so
overcome with brush, densely packed
trees, thorns, and downed wood
that traditional inventory of the site
became a herculean task.
That’s when MTE turned to Ayres
Associates – a firm they’d successfully
collaborated with on several past
aerial imagery projects – to explore
whether remote sensing technology
might be a more efficient and
affordable way to analyze the forest’s
regeneration and distinguish the
boundaries of the establishing forest
stands, or groupings of tree types.
“We did some ground surveys, and
we’ve been monitoring for the last 10
years on it. The issue that we were
faced with was that there was such
thick regrowth that you couldn’t see
more than 20 feet in front of you.
Trying to delineate homogenous
stands within that matrix was very
challenging,” said Crocker, referring to
how certain types of vegetation and
tree species tend to grow in clusters.
“We talked to Adam (Derringer) and
decided that using some high spatial
resolution and high spectral resolution
imagery would be a solution for
delineating those.”
Remote sensing involves accessing
and acquiring data without physically
touching it – in this case, from sensors
collecting visible and near-infrared
wavelength data from an airplane.
When planned correctly, this data can
be processed using advanced software
to identify objects of interest.
“We looked at this site and its
heterogenous vegetation cover and
knew that if we were to collect data at
just the right time in the fall, we could
More on MTE
M
enominee Tribal Enterprises
(MTE) is a tribal organization
responsible for forest operations
on the large land base held in
trust by the federal government
for the Menominee Indian Tribe of
Wisconsin. The Menominee Indians
– the oldest residents of Wisconsin –
inhabited the area more than 10,000
years ago. About 95 percent of the
land is forested, and approximately
90% of that acreage is under what’s
called sustained yield management.
This means that they follow specific
management procedures to ensure
that what’s harvested and sold is
replaced before more harvesting
takes place.
The tribally-owned operation
has been actively managing the
Menominee Forest since 1890 and
is regarded as an industry leader
in sustainable forestry. Fourteen
of the 16 forest types that exist in
the Lake States are represented
on the acreage the enterprise so
meticulously manages, including
northern hardwoods, aspen, oaks,
swamp conifers, and pine stands.
AyresAssociates.com
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