Vegetation Classification

Landsat TM imagery was used to map the North Olary plains in north-eastern South Australia on behalf of the Biological Survey Unit of the Department for Environment and Heritage. The increased spatial and spectral resolution over Landsat MSS, coupled with Landsat's 185x185km image area were the main factors behind the choice of this satellite and sensor for this project.

An unsupervised classification was used to sbroadly classify the two TM scenes required to cover the North Olary plains into information classes. In collaboration with an outside consultant, it was possible to classify the area down to genus in some areas, and associations in others.

The samples displayed show an example of one area which was classified. The colours on the classification represent the following:

• Yellow: Sclerolaena spp/grass
• Cyan: Maireana pyrmidata
• Dark cyan: Eremophila duttonii/Senna
• Light blue: Nitraria billardieri/Maireana pymridata
• Blue: Bare
• Orange: Mulga (Acacia aneura)
• Red: Samphire
• Dark yellow: Maireana astrotricha/Maireana pymiradata

Landsat ESI Image	Classification of same area