Vegetation indices guide: Common GIS applications
Blog post from Felt
Vegetation indices are crucial tools derived from remote-sensing technology, such as satellite and drone imagery, used to assess vegetation health, coverage, and drought stress by analyzing how plants absorb and reflect different wavelengths. These indices, including the well-known NDVI, GNDVI, and NDRE, help farmers, environmental analysts, and land managers monitor subtle changes in vegetation across large landscapes, facilitating the detection of crop stress, moisture conditions, and land cover changes. Despite their utility, vegetation indices face challenges like saturation in dense vegetation, soil brightness interference, and atmospheric effects, necessitating careful application and interpretation within geospatial workflows. Platforms like Felt enhance the utility of these indices by integrating them with additional spatial data in cloud-native GIS environments, allowing users to create interactive maps, synchronize field data, and streamline the analysis process with real-time observations and natural language querying.