Estimating and mapping Sabalan rangelands aboveground phytomass using Landsat 8 images

The aim of this study was to estimate and map the plant group and total aboveground phytomass using Landsat 8 images in the rangelands of Sabalan Mountain. Images were selected on the 19th of July 2013 and field data were collected in April and July based on maximum matching with the phenology of the study area and in the closest date to the time of image acquisition. Twenty-four sampling sites on six vegetation types were determined. In each site, 9 sampling plots, based on previous studies, which are required for minimum sample number according to the variance of vegetation distribution, were determined in a systematic-random method, and the aboveground phytomass of vegetation groups, such as grasses, forbs, shrubs and total, were determined using the harvesting method. Initially, to calculate vegetation indices, the averages of 16 pixel values of the location of sample units from the corrected images were derived and transferred to the software environment. The correlation matrices between the derived pixel values and field collected data for the 24 selected vegetation indices were calculated and used for the estimation of grasses, forbs, shrubs and total aboveground phytomass. The results showed that indices such as RVI, TNDVI and GNDVI had the highest correlation with the aboveground phytomass of grasses, PD312, IO and PD311 with the aboveground phytomass of forbs, RDVI, DVI and RVI with the shrubs, and PD311, PD321 and PD312 with the total aboveground phytomass (P