Getting Started with Drones for Forest Management
This morning, I talked with a forester who recently took charge of a program to obtain higher-quality earth observation imagery using a drone for their company. After a multi-year trial with satellite imagery and fixed-wing aerial photography, they opted to pursue a drone program due to the superior image quality, program flexibility and cost-effectiveness. They initially purchased a Mavic 3, and while it may not have been the most suitable tool for the job due to its inability to program flights (more on this later), they are managing well with it, and I wanted to share some of our thoughts after the call.
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Better data means better forest health
Huge. Healthier forests mean balancing harvesting with the socio-environmental benefits of our woodlands. Forest health is a byproduct of modern forestry - we have nothing to harvest if we don’t care for the forest lands we benefit from.
We can't manage what we can't measure. I often emphasize this point—the more effective our measurements, the better our management. The forestry industry has a long history of data collection, mostly using paper and pencils and, more recently, through the digitization of these processes for everything from block layout to forest health. However, capturing aerial imagery remains a challenge. The datasets are large, and many places still rely on manual photogrammetric processes. This is partly due to the high cost of servers and the perceived complexity of processing and evaluating this imagery.
Drones are the technological bridge in this process. For decades, terrestrial photos have been added to forestry surveys, but more to supplement pre-existing notes and documentation. However, they fail to provide a comprehensive standalone output to help evaluate what’s happening in the management area. Drones allow for a complete aerial view at a cost-effective rate.
The traditional methods of walking through a forestry block, manually capturing GPS data, and using small sample sizes to assess the overall site health are being replaced by a more efficient protocol. This new approach involves using a drone to fly over the forestry block from a single location and then using analytics tools to extract the necessary information for making the right management decisions.
The Accessibility of Drone Surveys
I can fly a drone, but I don’t know the first thing about using ArcGIS. Don’t worry; this is why we started Nova. Surveys with drones are only as effective as our ability to analyze post-flight data. If we’re waiting for our GIS tech to get into the office or waiting for the raw data to reach the top of their queue, we’re indirectly adding friction into a process that should otherwise be seamless.
This is why users love Nova. It's a data processing hub and GIS platform all wrapped together. It's simple enough to navigate and access your data with ease and process imagery data without the complexity of traditional platforms. Despite the ease of use, the resulting outputs are designed to be just as powerful as traditional systems, creating a must-have addition for your toolkit.
If you are reading this, you probably already know why you want to use a drone. Whether it's for road mapping or block layout and assessing where you're going to lay ribbon or for scanning burn piles to ensure that your fuels management work isn't a flight risk, survey drones are incredible tools for capturing data. Digital photogrammetry tools like Nova's Orthomosaic plugin can create stunning outputs.
Now that I have the data, what should I do with it? This is where Nova really stands out. It's one thing to create a data product, like an orthomosaic, or capture video and overlay it on a satellite base layer, but how do we engage end-users? Typically, organizations follow a workflow where a drone pilot captures data, a GIS technician processes the images and creates a map, and then the end-users (such as government regulatory bodies or field technicians) receive the product. Nova changes this approach by providing tools to drone users, allowing them to not only create an orthomosaic of an area where they plan to build a road or assess their over-winter burn piles for smoldering heat, but also immediately turn those products into georeferenced PDF maps for use by ground crews.
Anything you create and store in Nova can be exported as a point or file layer, allowing your GIS staff to analyze it later. Nova's pipeline simplifies the entire process, enabling you to transform raw image files into powerful maps in just minutes rather than hours.
The Power of Automated Flight Paths
Earlier today, we encountered an issue using the Mavic 3 as a mapping drone. While the Mavic 3 is a great drone, and DJI products are generally reliable, choosing the right tool for the job is essential. The specific version of the Mavic 3 being used by our client, Steve Young with Dryden Forest Management Co., cannot automate flight paths or image capture intervals. This limitation makes it very challenging to capture images effectively for mapping purposes.
My initial suggestion was that Steve fly manually, but then you end up with flight paths that look like this:
Figure 1. Flight path that looks a bit like a plate of spaghetti—courtesy of Steve Young, Dryden Forest Management.
Luckily Nova still created a beautiful orthomosaic:
Figure 2. Orthomosaic generated of a block layout from the above flight path (see Figure 1)—courtesy of Steve Young, Dryden Forest Management.
In the end, flying manually significantly increased the time required for what should have been a simple data collection mission. My advice was not very helpful, or at least not complete. The inability to carry out automated flights and data capture not only prolongs the time spent in the field, ensuring complete coverage but also drains the battery faster, resulting in unnecessarily extended flight times. We all know how quickly a day in the field can turn into multiple days. Steve uses this flight planning software to help him overcome some of the limitations of the Mavic 3: Waypointmap.com
So, if you’re starting out, make sure you’re buying the right drone. We recommend the DJI Matrice 350 RTK with the P1 sensor, the H30 Series for burn piles, or, if you’re a bit more budget-conscious, the Matrice 30T or the Mavic 3 Enterprise (not to be confused with the Mavic 3 that Steve purchased).
Equipment Recommendations
Starting a drone program is rewarding and it can bring a lot of value to your organization. It can also be intimidating and its easy to make mistakes - if you’re looking for some guidance, reach out. We’ll not only make sure that you have the right tools to create powerful products to up your forestry game, but we’ll also ensure that you pick up the right drone, so when you’re on your way out the door, you can feel confident.