LIDAR for the win ( tree risk assessment , tree decline, tree moisture content measurement )

[colb]

This is going to do amazing things to/for you:

 

[cerviarborist]

Having worked on "ground-truthing" assignments for LIDAR providers and end users, I agree that it does show a lot of promise. Seeing the difficulties LIDAR (and near infra red technologies) had discerning the difference between Fraxinus and Juglans, at one particular time of the year though, I think there's still a long way to go in development before LIDAR will be saving the world.

 

[colb]

Having worked on "ground-truthing" assignments for LIDAR providers and end users, I agree that it does show a lot of promise. Seeing the difficulties LIDAR (and near infra red technologies) had discerning the difference between Fraxinus and Juglans, at one particular time of the year though, I think there's still a long way to go in development before LIDAR will be saving the world.

I think this guy is focusing more on water saturation as a metric of individual tree health. That's why he's so shiggly wiggly about it. If he was identifying species he'd be a bit more wiggly shiggly... It's all there in the video.

 

[Basswood]

That video was awesome. Really cool technology. Is this application mainly utilized for forestry? Any usage in the more residential/commercial spectrum for assessing trees?

 

[cerviarborist]

I think this guy is focusing more on water saturation as a metric of individual tree health. That's why he's so shiggly wiggly about it. If he was identifying species he'd be a bit more wiggly shiggly... It's all there in the video.

Before you know whether the saturation is appropriate, you'd want to be sure of the species. Or did that suddenly become one-size-fits-all?

 

[colb]

Before you know whether the saturation is appropriate, you'd want to be sure of the species. Or did that suddenly become one-size-fits-all?

I see where you are going with that and agree that ID-ing and other inter-tree comparisons are important capabilities. I was a bit tunnel-visioned by the thought of comparisons within a tree that might point to specific structural issues. For instance, if two limbs emanating from the same union have different profiles, an arborist with LiDAR experience could increase their capacity to assign and mitigate risk more accurately. Maybe they would try to increase access to sunlight for one limb more than the other, prescribe reduction pruning on one side more than the other, or recommend limb removal if the profiles were extremely different. LiDAR has been applied to forest communities for almost 15 years, so my renewed excitement is more about what it can bring to bear within a single tree.