Welcome to this month’s issue of foresttech.news
The ForestTECH 2018 event has just been completed. Many of you were involved as delegates. Feedback from this year’s series has again been excellent. Thanks. If you were there or just interested, images taken over the two weeks can be viewed on the event website by clicking here.
Details relating to how delegates (this year we attracted over 250 resource managers, remote sensing managers, GIS and mapping specialists and inventory foresters – not only from Australia and New Zealand but his year from Chile, South Africa, Malaysia and Indonesia) can download the presentations given as part of the New Zealand and Australian events have been sent out. If planning on downloading, best do this in the next week or so. We’ll close access off to the over 25 presentations on the site just before the Christmas break.
A couple of take homes for the organisers from ForestTECH 2018 has been again the speed at which the technology is evolving and the rapid uptake of new technology and early integration into operations by local forestry companies. Advances in the use of daily satellite imagery and the array of opportunities being opened up through the use of VR and AR to this and other parts of our industry will certainly provide a platform for further discussion in this newsletter – and in the 2019 event.
Anyway, for the final issue of the year we cover a story on a Seattle-based start-up company, DroneSeed. As the name suggests, custom UAV platforms are being equipped with multispectral camera arrays, high-end lidar, 23 litre tanks of herbicide and proprietary seed dispersal mechanisms. They’re being used principally for tree planting from the air. Not a bad option when you think about it with both New Zealand and Australia looking at some fairly ambitious tree planting targets in the upcoming years with labour not exactly readily available in some of the more remote locations being targeted.
Other stories feature a new detailed report (link included) that’s just been produced by FrontierSI, formally the CRC for Spatial Information titled UAV Data Acquisition, Australia and New Zealand, which is well worth a read and a number of updates on new satellite imagery.
That’s it for 2018. Thanks for your support and contributions over the year. Have a great Christmas break and we’ll make contact again early next year.
Stories this issue:
- ForestTECH 2018 – Event Summary
- Drone delivery takes off in Australia
- Family business at the forefront of processing photogrammetry
- DroneSeed automating tree planting
- Future search and rescue autonomous drones
- New technology to remotely assess individual trees
- AU start-up hitches a ride with Rocket Lab
- Tips for UAV takeoffs and landings
- GEDI to yield 3D forest carbon map
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