Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit, Great Plains CESU

The USGS is offering a funding opportunity to a CESU partner for research in grassland forage production mapping to aid in drought adaptive management. A robust forage production mapping approached based on remote sensing and weather data will isolate forage production changes associated with historical droughts (2000-2015). 1) A proof of concept journal article is expected at a smaller regional study, with 2) subsequent expansion to western conterminous U.S. grasslands is anticipated with a second associated journal article. Finally, 3) either forage production maps from judiciously selected weather scenarios will allow prediction of 3 or more summer scenarios given current spring conditions OR near-real time growing season long forage production estimation by late spring. Mapping resolution is anticipated to be 250m or smaller and probably based on MODIS vegetation indices. It is anticipated that these goals would assist in meeting requirements of a PhD dissertation and hopefully can be developed in to an operational drought product.