Application of phenological observations in agrometeorological models and climate change research

This paper intends to give a brief overview on the different approaches existing in plant phenological studies. The history of plant phenological observations in Europe and Hungary shows that the aim of the observations turned from the pure scientific interest to the application in agricultural practice, and recently, to climatic studies. Modeling of phenological development is demonstrated via examples for wheat and maize. The analysis of historical data has got new horizons by the international efforts done by COST Actions. New perspectives in observations of vegetation are remote sensing data. Vegetation indices like normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and enhanced vegetation index (EVI) are also used for tracking the seasonal development of plants, and they give opportunity to analyze the year by year change.