Mapping the Forest Change: Using Landsat Imagery in Forest Transition Analysis within the Medvednica Protected Area

Abstract

The Medvednica Nature Park was established in 1981. At that time its main phenomena were forests and forest communities which covered some two thirds of the protected area. The Park is located in close vicinity to Zagreb, the largest city in Croatia, which has been characterised by a considerable growth in population and area during the last several decades.This article reconstructs a segment of Medvednica protected area's environmental history from 1978 to 2007. The study combines textual and tabular as well as cartographic and remote sensing data in order to provide a clear insight into the proportions of deforestation and reforestation, and their spatial patterns across the entire area of the Park.Results indicate forest transition on more than one tenth of the protected area. These are mostly contact zones of human activities and forest communities located at the edges of the protected area and at its higher elevations. Results also indicate net forest gain of 8.3% over the 1978-2007 period. S obzirom na to da su šume bile glavni razlog osnutka Parka prirode Medvednica, primarni fokus istraživanja bio je usmjeren upravo na prostorne promjene šumskog pokrova. Rezultati upućuju da se promjena šumskog pokrova (deforestacija ili reforestacija) odvija na više od jedne desetine ukupne površine Parka. Riječ je o kontaktnim zonama ljudskih aktivnosti i šumskih zajednica koje se nalaze uglavnom na rubu te zonama na višim nadmorskim visinama zaštićenog područja. Rezultati također pokazuju da bilanca prostornih promjena šumskog pokrova ide u korist reforestacije za otprilike 8. 3% tijekom razdoblja 1978. -2007.

Land cover changes in northern Croatia from 1981 to 2011

“…However, the built-up class was classified a bit more successfully because of the manual delineation with DOF5 from 2011. Compared to other Croatian papers with a similar topic (Valožić and Cvitanović, 2011;Horvat, 2013;Cvitanović, 2014a;2014b; Točnost klasifikacije mjerena je matricom konfuzije i kapa-koeficijentom, kao najčešće korištenim metodama u citiranoj literaturi (Story i Congalton, 1986;Horvat, 2013;Cvitanović, 2014a;2014b;Valožić, 2014;2015).…”

Three Decades of Urban Forest and Green Space Research and Practice in Croatia and Slovenia

“…Gardens of educational organizations such as schools were addressed in four papers [75,[77][78][79]. Field inventory as a method prevailed, but in some papers, remote sensing was used for this purpose [80][81][82]. Several mostly conference papers provided inventories of tree lines, e.g., [83].…”

(Post)socijalizam i okoliš: promjena kulturnoga krajobraza Pridravske nizine Osijeka u posljednjih pedeset godina

“…Georeferenciranje se provelo pomoću lako prepoznatljivih elemenata karte kao što su prometni čvorovi, dravske okuke i sl. (Valožić, Cvitanović, 2011.). Nakon što je karta georeferencirana, pomoću funkcije create random points u programu ArcGIS 9.2 odabrano je sto lokacija površine 50x50 metara koji su metodom vizualne interpretacije klasificirane u jednu od devet (šest) glavnih kategorija zemljišnoga pokrova i korištenja zemljišta prema sustavu prilagođenom za daljinska istraživanja (Anderson i sur., 1976.).…”