Remotely-sensed phenological metrics (or phenometrics) were derived from AVHRR vegetation-index time-series data and to describes seasonal growth in terms of start, end, length of season and estimates of net primary production (NPP). This study analyzed vegetation phenometrics across South Africa (SA) in order to characterize phenological patterns and their inter-annual variability. A second objective is to distinguish biomes and sub-biome “bioregions” based on functional patterns. The long term phenometrics gave ecologically-meaningful results which reflect our current understanding of the spatial patterns of production and seasonality of vegetation growth. The results suggest that phenometrics capture sufficient functional diversity to classify and map vegetation based on function.
Reference:
Steenkamp, K.C., Wessels, K.J., Archibald, S, et al. 2009. Satellite derived phenology of Southern Africa for 1985-2000 and functional classification of vegetation based on phenometrics. 33rd International Symposium on Remote Sensing of Environment: Sustaining the Millennium Development Goals, Stresa, Lago Magglore, Italy, 4-8 May 2009, pp 4.
Steenkamp, K. C., Wessels, K. J., Archibald, S., & Von Maltitz, G. P. (2009). Satellite derived phenology of southern Africa for 1985-2000 and functional classification of vegetation based on phenometrics. http://hdl.handle.net/10204/4985
Steenkamp, Karen C, Konrad J Wessels, S Archibald, and Graham P Von Maltitz. "Satellite derived phenology of southern Africa for 1985-2000 and functional classification of vegetation based on phenometrics." (2009): http://hdl.handle.net/10204/4985
Steenkamp KC, Wessels KJ, Archibald S, Von Maltitz GP, Satellite derived phenology of southern Africa for 1985-2000 and functional classification of vegetation based on phenometrics; 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/10204/4985 .