Dawson Los Monos Canyon Reserve Pasture and Creek UAV LiDAR Survey, CA 2024

Residual Dry Matter (RDM) refers to the non-green/non-photosynthetic annual plant material left on the ground at the end of a growing season. Managing RDM is important for fire and grazing management in California Rangeland ecosystems. Estimating RDM through traditional field methods is labor, cost, and time-intensive, making large-scale sampling challenging. Remote sensing has been proposed to monitor RDM, however, traditional multispectral sensors often confuse RDM with bare soil due to limited spectral bands. UAV LiDAR is an alternative solution for remotely sensing RDM, however the utility and applicability of UAV LiDAR for estimating RDM in California Rangeland ecosystems is unknown. This pilot study at UC San Diego's Dawson Los Monos Canyon Reserve (a precursor to a large-scale study across Jack and Laura Dangermond Preserve with The Nature Conservancy) was conducted to determine the optimal LiDAR flight parameters and point density for estimating plot-scale RDM. A portion of Agua Hedionda Creek was also flown as part of this mission. This dataset has 3 files: 1. 120m AGL @4m/s flight of pasture: 558 points/m2 2. 60m AGL @2m/s flight of a portion of Agua Hedionda Creek: 2230 points/m2 3. 60m AGL @ 2m/s flight of pasture: 2230 points/m2 30m AGL @ 1m/s: 8921 and Structure from Motion Imagery of the pasture is also available upon request. These data exceed the storage limitation on the Community Dataspace Flights were conducted by Lloyd (Pete) Coulter and Wes Ramos who are certified FAA Part 107 Pilots at San Diego State University COA Permit Completed by Jon Witsell Reserve Day Use Permits were issued by UC San Diego Natural Reserve System Special thank you to the students at Palomar College and UCSD Staff for help with field data collection

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