new paper - Phenology-based classification of invasive annual grasses to the species level

The Great Basin Landscape Ecology Lab and Center for Transformative Environmental Monitoring Programs has a new paper in Remote Sensing of Environment that uses drones to map two different invasive grasses in the Great Basin - cheatgrass and medusahead.  Our study found that we could effectively differentiate the species using three well-timed flights and a simple red-green-blue camera.  Using unmanned aerial vehicles we were able to accurately map the occurrence of these two different invasive species on the landscape. You can read our paper by clicking HERE.

Great Basin LCC Webinar is now available online

 Marjorie did a wonderful job of presenting our ongoing work this past Monday on pygmy rabbits.  If you didn't get a chance to watch the presentation live you can catch a recorded version here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loAHd86Fvsk&edit=vd

Upcoming Great Basin LCC Webinar on Pygmy Rabbit

Marjorie Matocq is presenting next Monday for the Great Basin Landscape Conservation Cooperative webinar series.  Sign up at http://greatbasinlcc.org/webinar-series .  If you can't make it there will be a recorded seminar available on YouTube in a couple of weeks.

Nevada - last in the nation for LiDAR coverage

As Nevadans we're used to placing last or near last in lots of socioeconomic indicators. According to the USGS 3DEP program we may well be last in another category: LiDAR coverage.

LiDAR or laser altimetry is a valuable technology used for mapping all sorts of things ranging from building heights to flood zones to timber volumes.  I've used LiDAR a lot in my own work, and I believe that it is moving beyond a new cool tool to a critical piece of data infrastructure.  In fact, a lot of remote sensing products rely strongly on LiDAR.  As a state we need to be thinking about investing in LiDAR data if we want to solve the 21st century problems that all of the other states are solving.