Computer analysis of Landsat, Thematic Mapper imagery and existing road locations for elk habitat mapping in northern California
- Department of Forestry, College of Natural Resources and Sciences, Humboldt State University, Arcata, California 95521 (United States)
- State of California, The Resources Agency, Department of Fish & Game, Shasta Valley Wildlife Area, 1724 Ball Mountain Road, Montague, California 96064 (United States)
We analyzed Landsat, Thermatic Mapper imagery and previously mapped, road locations to identify vegetation classes and measure elk habitat quality throughout a 350,810 hectare study area in north-central California. Computerized image classification procedures were used to identify and map 26 classes of vegetation cover and ten classes of non-vegetated land. A geographic information system was used to integrate road locations, quantify forage and cover quality ratings for vegetation types, and calculate an elk habitat quality index. Vegetation classes were aggregated into three forage quality and three cover quality ratings. Road locations were used to define corridors of low habitat quality, representing hunting pressure. Mountainous regions were dominated by conifer forest types and foothill regions were dominated by Juniper-Pine-Grass types. The valley region contained large amounts of the sage and rabbit brush types. Thirty-four percent of the western third of the study area, dominated by foothills and mountains, was classed as good habitat. By contrast the central and eastern portions of the study area, dominated by the valley region and mountains, contained a small proportion (12 percent) of the better habitats. {copyright} {ital 1996 American Institute of Physics.}
- OSTI ID:
- 385529
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-960109-; ISSN 0094-243X; TRN: 9618M0130
- Journal Information:
- AIP Conference Proceedings, Vol. 361, Issue 1; Conference: STAIF 96: space technology and applications international forum, Albuquerque, NM (United States), 7-11 Jan 1996; Other Information: PBD: Mar 1996
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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