Real-time climate monitoring using an AVHRR-based vegetation index

A normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) has been produced and archived on a 1° latitude by 1° longitude grid between 55°S and 75°N. The many sources of data errors in the NDVI include cloud contamination, scan angle biases, changes in solar zenith angle, and sensor degradation. Week-to-week variability, primarily caused by cloud contamination and scan angle biases, can be minimized by temporally filtering the data. Orbital drift and sensor degradation introduces interannual variability into the dataset. These trends make the usefulness of a long-term climatology uncertain and limit the usefulness of the NDVI. Elimination of these problems should produce an index that can be used for climate monitoring.

Fire, climate, and vegetation: the sedimentary record of fire in montane meadows, Sierra Nevada, California, USA [abstract]

EXTRACT (SEE PDF FOR FULL ABSTRACT): Though knowledge of fire occurrence and weather pattern relationships has been used for many years by land managers in, for instance, prescribed fire planning, understanding of the relationship between Holocene climates and fire is just beginning to be investigated. We are investigating this relationship in a major mountain range in California, examining charcoal and pollen content in sediments of montane meadows to compare paleo-fire and paleo-vegetation (thus, climate) sequences for the Holocene.

Ecological monitoring of trawling grounds

The development of mechanized fishing in India is traced to point out the harmful effects of trawling by way of disturbing the ecological balance of the ecosystem, of which the fish stocks are a part. It may cause the disappearance of some demersal species from the catches as brought out poignantly in the case of a marine catfish namely, Arius tenuispinis. History of trawling has been the same all over the world showing that depletion of demersal fish stocks is not only due to excessive harvesting but also due to the damage done to the ecological balance of the trawling grounds. The need for ecological monitoring of the trawling grounds is pointed out.