2015 Volume 52 Issue 2 Pages 119-129
Leaf-coloring information published on web sites was evaluated for its utility in ground-truthing satellite remote-sensing data for mapping leaf phenology. We first collected leaf-coloring information from several web sites in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan, from 21 to 25 November 2014; we then evaluated the relationship between that leaf-coloring information and the green–red vegetation index (GRVI) derived from Landsat-8/OLI imaging on 23 November 2014. We found that (1) most of the leaf-coloring information available on web sites was for popular scenic areas in the Hakone and Tanzawa mountains and cities of Kamakura and Yokohama; (2) leaf-coloring information covering multiple points in mountainous regions was useful for ground-truthing satellite remote-sensing data in relation to altitude; and (3) leaf-coloring information published on web sites included uncertainties due to differing definitions of leaf-coloring phenology, imprecise locations of reported points, heterogeneity of vegetation, and imprecise correspondence between area of reported location and area per pixel in satellite remote-sensing data.
