Abstract

Seven types of vegetations viz., sal forest, sal mixed forest, moist mixed forest, dry mixed forest, seral vegetation, high grass and low grass, were identified and delineated by visual interpretation of satellite data (Landsat TM-FCC 1:50,000 scale). However, there was difficulty in delineating agricultural/fallow lands by visual interpretation. But in computer aided digital analysis, in addition to all the seven vegetations identified through visual interpretation, agricultural fallow lands were identified and demarcated in view of better separability of tonal variations. Comparison of visual interpretation and digital analysis methods revealed that there was no significant difference between these two methods of analysis as far as total areal extent of the study area was concerned. However, there were differences between the two methods of analysis regarding the areal extent of different vegetation/forest types identified within the study area. If situations warrants use of single band data for vegetation studies, we can use band 5 data of Landsat TM as it was able to give better spectral separability among different vegetations.

Keywords: Remote sensing, ecosystem, environment, visual interpretation, digital analysis, satellite imagery