African Wildlife and Environment Issue 66

CONSERVATION

CONSERVATION

Bush encroachment management The use of multi-spectral remote sensing data in the mapping of woody vegetation canopy cover has been used in many countries with great success. Vegetation indices (such as the Normalised Difference Vegetation Index – NDVI) became a standardised tool in the processing and extraction of vegetation information from digital imagery that covered the near infrared spectrum. The increased demand for alternative bio energy sources turned the attention to the mapping of bush encroachment, thereby introducing a new challenge of bio-mass estimations. Tree canopy cover, with added information on tree height for specific species, provides the opportunity to estimate volume and biomass from remote sensing data sources. Point clouds extracted from Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) and Digital Surface Model (DSM) data are some of the latest tools from which tree height can be calculated. Calibration for specific tree species per habitat is however crucial in these calculations. Fig 2 shows woody cover maps derived from SPOT Satellite imagery. Cloud based project management systems are also a recent development, aiding environmental project managers to capture project information (including location, reports, and photographs) in an on-line system which can be linked to a stand-alone GIS systems. Such a system (Bushmon – www.bushmon. co.za) was developed for the North West University to capture projects on bush encroachment. The system included a Google Maps interface and plays an important role in project management which includes monitoring and evaluation (see Fig 3). Drones: New technology with high accuracy - calculating tree heights The use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) or ‘drones’ has been accepted as an integral part of environmental mapping projects. These cost-effective remote-sensing platforms can be used with great success to capture ortho-photos and Digital Surface Model (DSM) data at a very high resolution for small to medium sized projects.

Conclusion Geospatial Information applications have been at the forefront of technology for decades. However, satellite imagery and GIS systems required specialist knowledge and were costly to access and use. All this is changing. The wave of new and integrative technologies accessible by many with an interest in conservation is a prime example of disruptive innovation that leads to big changes. Conservation and improved management of the environmentwill gain fromthedisruptive technologies of today. Drones, integrated smartphone devices, pervasive broadband communication and improved

Fig 4: Profile analysis of processed drone data – tree height calculations

Fig 3: The Bushmon project management system developed for the North West University.

Apps on citizen scientists’ smartphones are increasingly important, and make input of data easier. More importantly, data quality can be improved with the availability of GPS and point data with high geometric accuracy, and the options for analysis and data mining also increase significantly. An example of observations in the Wakkerstroom area making use of the BirdLasser App is shown in Fig. 6. The database of bird distribution is valuable in many different ways: • Opportunities for scientific research with the geospatial dataset abound. Many scientific

Drones were recently used to evaluate the use of point cloud data to calculate woody vegetation cover and height in the D’Nyala Nature Reserve near Lephalale in the Limpopo Province. Global Mapper™ provided the perfect tool to process the point cloud and to calculate the height above ground for various tree species (see Fig 4). The use of drones is however a specialised operation and all legal requirements should be adhered to. Crowd-sourcing projects: Mapping the distribution of bird species (www.sabap2.org.za) The Second Southern African Bird Atlas Project (SABAP2) is the most important bird conservation project in the region. Many other conservation initiatives depend on the results of the bird atlas: • One cannot determine the conservation status of a bird species unless you know its range and how this is changing; • ‘Red-listing’ of species depends on the results of this project; • The selection of sites and habitats that are critical to bird conservation can be defined; and • There are many more examples underlining the value of this project. SABAP2 is the follow-up project to the Southern African Bird Atlas Project, which is now referred to as SABAP1 and that took place from 1987-1991. This second bird atlas project started a decade ago, and is planned to run indefinitely. The Animal Demography Unit (ADU) at the University of Cape Town, BirdLife South Africa and the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI) participate in and support this project. More than two thousand volunteers, known as citizen scientists, do the fieldwork. The original atlas area was South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland. Namibia, Zimbabwe and Kenya have now been included. Today the SABAP2 database contains more than 189 000 checklists. Fig 5 indicates the present coverage of more than 78% of the initial SABAP2 atlas area, which is an awesome achievement.

Fig 6: Point data provide valuable datasets in sensitive areas of conservation interest

GIS functionality are but a few such examples. The best news is that the costs of accessing and using these tools have lowered dramatically, and this trend is set to continue. If these tools are fully leveraged, conservation and environmental management will benefit, and so will future generations.

Fig. 5: SABAP2 coverage map - June 2017

publications have already seen the light, and increasingly citizen scientists play an important role. ( see http://bo.adu.org.za/ for Biodiversity Observations, an initiative of the ADU) • Data analysed for bird species distribution can provide an early warning of the effects of climate change. It is a valuable input to the ongoing climate change discourse. • Public awareness and participation in conservation projects is increased. Information can be shared – bird-lists are created based on actual observations; an example is Birds of the Magaliesberg . This in turn has a positive impact on tourism and an interest in outdoor activities.

Mr Dirk Pretorius Professional GIS Practitioner dirk@smc-synergy.co.za Mr Renier Balt SMC Sunergy renier@smc-synergy.co.za

Fig 2: Woody cover maps using SPOT 6 data for the Cookhouse and Somerset East Areas

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13 | African Wildlife & Environment | 66 (2017)