Deriving dynamic information on fire fuel distributions in southern Californian chaparral from remotely sensed data

Stow, D.; Hope, A.; Mckinsey, D.; Pray, H.

The major objective of the research reported in this paper was to perform a pilot study for mapping fire fuel properties of southern Californian chaparral shrubs and associated forest ecotones using multi-date (seasonal) Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) image data. Information on past, current and future (predicted) distributions of vegetation properties pertaining to fire fuels are necessary for understanding, monitoring, managing and modeling fire in changing Mediterranean landscapes. Seasonal and interannual variability of some vegetation properties can be extracted from multi-date remotely sensed data that may provide useful information pertaining to fire fuel distributions.