RESEARCH ARTICLE

ASSESSMENT OF Lantana camara (L) DISTRIBUTION IN UDAWALAWE NATIONAL PARK, SRI LANKA, USING REMOTE SENSING TECHNIQUES

Abstract

The Invasive Alien Species (IAS) is spreading rapidly by disturbing other living organisms which are native to a particular area. Especially, this topic has been discussed often with the environmental disturbances arising due to climate changes and anthropogenic activities. Mainly, IAS is spreading rapidly with the environmental disturbances such as fire, land clearing, landslides, flooding, cattle grassing, etc. Lantana camara is a destructive invasive plant which is spreading rapidly in tropical countries by destroying natural habitats. Udawalawe National Park in Sri Lanka is one of the world famous national parks for Asian elephants that is located in the dry zone of the country. Elephants in this national park are often found to be suffering from malnutrition due to drought impacts and the situation has worsened due to the rapid spreading of the L. camara. Elephants do not eat L. camara and this rapid spreading does not allow the growth of other palatable species in disturbed areas. Thus, food production of the Udawalawe National Park has been decreasing rapidly making elephants more vulnerable. This study was planned to find out an inexpensive method to identify the distribution of L. camara in Udawalawe National Park to make a better plan for the habitat improvement purposes.

Landsat 08 satellite images were used for this study which can be downloaded free of charge from the USGS (United State Geological Survey) website. Resolution of this satellite image is 30m x 30m. Thus, one pixel represents the 900 m2 in ground level. But according to the field observation, most of the affected sites of L. camara could be identified as very big patches. Therefore, the resolution of the image does not make a huge impact for this study. Garmin accuracy +/-3 m three handheld Global Positioning System (GPS) devices were used to obtain the accurate locations of 25 sample points in selected sites. ArcGIS 10.4 software was used for the supervised classification to identify the distribution of L. camara with reflectance values. As well as reflectance patterns of the Blue, Green, Red and Near Infrared bands were considered after the classification using MS Excel statistical methods. Further verifications were done by observing selected locations on field visits.

Total land extent of the Udawalawe National Park is 31,067 ha. According to the result, L. camara has been invading the extent of 2,650 ha highly dense and 910 ha mixed dense of the national park. Most of these areas were identified as often disturbing areas besides the road network in the national park. Some lands are Teak (Tectona grandis) cleared sites and after the clearance, L. camara has been rapidly spreading. Output of this study is very important to identify the invaded extent of the L.camara in the National Park. Distribution map of the L. camara is very useful to develop a better habitat improving mechanism to control this major IAS distribution within the National Park. Thus, the remote sensing technique is an expensive method, findings of this study are really applicable for developing countries like Sri Lanka, which cannot use more expensive high resolution satellite images for analysis.

Keywords: Invasive Alien Species, ArcGIS, Classification. Lantana camara (L.), Udawalawe

How to Cite: Suraweera,P.A.C.N.B,Nalaka Kodippili,,Fernando,G.M.T.S,Kumari,B.H.G.K, (2016). ASSESSMENT OF Lantana camara (L) DISTRIBUTION IN UDAWALAWE NATIONAL PARK, SRI LANKA, USING REMOTE SENSING TECHNIQUES.WILDLANKA, 4(4):Pages 181-189

Published On:2016-12-31

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