1. Joint Experiment for Crop Assessing and Monitoring
JECAM
Joint Experiment for Crop Assessing and Monitoring
ARGENTINA
SITE
Paticipants: Carlos Di Bella
Diego de Abelleyra
Santiago Verón
Alejandro Thompson

2. JECAM Objectives:
The goal of JECAM is to reach a convergence of approaches, develop monitoring and reporting protocols and best practices for a variety of global agricultural systems.
JECAM will facilitate the comparisson of results of crop monitoring based on different sources of data and methodologies over a variety of global cropping systems

3. JECAM proposal for Argentina

4. Production Systems in the Argentina Pampas
Mostly no till systems in rainfed conditions
Principal soil use:
Winter crops: Wheat, Barley
Summer crops: Soybean, Maize, Sunflower
Grasslands and Pastures

5. Study Site: San Antonio de Areco
- Location: 100 Km from Buenos Aires
- Representative rural area of the Argentine Pampas
- Part of the ondulated pampa (gently slopes and rivers).
- Soils: composed mostly of Mollisols (Deep surface layer with high organic mater content) being one of the most productives zones of Argentina
20 Km
San Antonio de Areco
100 Km
70 Km
Buenos Aires

6. Crop Production = harvested area x mean yield
SOYBEAN harvested area (Ha)
WHEAT harvested area (Ha)
SOYBEAN mean yield (Kg/Ha)
WHEAT mean yield (Kg/Ha)
SOYBEAN Production (Tn)
WHEAT Production (Tn)
Crop production statistics at national level in Argentina ( ). MINAGRI

7. Interanual variability in crop production
variablity in planted area of each crop
variability in crop yield
Environmental situation (drought, water excess)
Crop management practices
In addition to available optical information, RADAR systems, because of their ability to obtain images independently of cloud conditions, assure the acquisition of images in the key periods that determine crop yields.
Nevertheless, studies that relates RADAR indices and crop status are not as frequent as what was done with optical sensors.

8. Main objective of Argentine JECAM Site:
Estimate parameters that describe wheat and soybean growth and algorithms that allow the identification of different crop species in the Argentine Pampas through the integration of information derived from optical and RADAR systems.

9. 1. Estimation of biophysical parameters in wheat and soybean crops
2. Crop type and tillage system classification, and phenological events identification
Objectives at Argentina site:
- High frequency of in situ observations and image aquisitions
- Smaller area
- Lower frequency of in situ observations and image aquisitions
- Larger area
70 Km
20 Km
San Antonio de Areco
Intensive data collection area
Extensive data collection area

10. Crop Calendar in Argentine Pampas
Extensive data collection timing and required image acquisitions
SOYBEAN
MAIZE
WHEAT
J J A S O N D J F M A M J
Intensive data collection timing and required image acquisitions
(wheat and soybean crops)

11. Image Data required:
RADAR:
X band: TerraSAR X
C band: RADARSAT-2, ENVISAT ASAR
L band: ALOS PALSAR
Optical:
LANDSAT 5
MODIS
ALOS AVNIR-2
ALOS PRISM
LISS 3-4
AWIFS
HJ1-Hyperspectral

12. Field campaign measurements carried out during 2010-2011

13. Intensive data collection
Measurements on wheat (august to november 2010) and early and late soybean crops (november 2010 to april 2011):
Crop biomass
Crop water content
Crop Height
fAPAR
Crop cover / LAI
Crop phenology
Gravimetric soil moisture (0-5 cm)
Measurement frequency: 24 days aprox.
Additional measurements: row direction, row space, in situ soil moisture sensors with dataloggers
Measurements over fallow plots:
- Green cover
- Gravimetric soil moisture (0-5 cm)

14. Intensive data collection area - Field Campaign 2010/2011
Plots:
Wheat / Late Soybean
Wheat / Fallow
Fallow / Early Soybean
Measurements every 24 days from august 2010 to april 2011

15. Extensive surveys:
August / September 2010: Identification of winter crops, fallow and grassland areas and Identification of conventional ploughing plots
October 2010: Identification of heading in wheat fields
January / February 2011: Identification of summer crops (maize, soybean, sorghum)

16. Extensive data collection area - Field Campaign 2010/2011 -
Surveys:
Crop type
Tillage system
Phenological state (wheat heading)

17. Images acquired at San Antonio de Areco during

18. RADARSAT-2 acquisitions (C band) - Extensive Field Campaign 2010/2011
Main acquisition periods:
October 2010
December 2010
February 2011
March 2011
* Available at CCRS catalogue

19. RADARSAT-2 acquisitions (C band) - Intensive Field Campaign 2010/2011
Acq. Date
Beam Mode
Pass Dir
04/23/2011
FQ16
Ascending
02/27/2011
FQ21
02/03/2011
01/30/2011
Descending
01/23/2011
01/10/2011
01/06/2011
12/17/2010
12/13/2010
11/30/2010
11/23/2010
11/19/2010
11/12/2010
11/06/2010
10/30/2010
10/26/2010
* Available at CCRS catalogue

20. ALOS PALSAR (L band) acquisitions – Field campaign 2010-2011
Beam Mode
Off Nadir Angle
Start
Path Number
Frame Number
PLR
21.5
APR 86
6500
FBS
34.3
FEB 91
6490
JAN 90
JAN
NOV
FBD
OCT
SEP
AUG
JUL
* Available at ALOS catalogue

21. Other obtained images - Field Campaign 2010/2011
LANDSAT 5 TM: Paths/Rows: & 225/84
daily MOD09 & MYD09: 250 m resolution
EO-1 ALI (August 2010)
LANDSAT
Tiles

22. Preliminary results

23. Daily MODIS 250 m – Wheat fields – San Antonio de Areco
Original data
Sowing dates:
Early wheat: 06/09/2010 (161)
Late wheat: 07/15/2010 (197)
BRDF corrected data

24. Future activities:
- RADAR image analysis (availabilty of RADARSAT-2 images required)
Continue analyzing relations between crop parameters and image derived information (optical and RADAR indices)
Add RADAR information to improve typical land use classifcations perfomed with optical images (LANDSAT)
MODIS BRDF correction validation

25. Thank you!
Obrigado!