Object-oriented Classification and QuickBird Multi-spectral Imagery in Forest Density Mapping

Forest cover density studies using high resolution satellite data and object oriented classification are limited in India. This article focuses on the potential use of QuickBird satellite data and object oriented classification in forest density mapping. In this study, the high-resolution satellite data was classified based on NDVI/pixel based and object oriented classification methods and results were compared. The QuickBird satellite data was found to be suitable in forest density mapping. Object oriented classification was superior than the NDVI/pixel based classification. The Object oriented classification method classified all the density classes of forest (dense, open, degraded and bare soil) with higher producer and user accuracies and with more kappa statistics value compared to pixel based method. The overall classification accuracy and Kappa statistics values of the object oriented classification were 83.33% and 0.77 respectively, which were higher than the pixel based classification (68%, 0.56 respectively). According to the Z statistics, the results of these two classifications were significantly different at 95% confidence level.