Remote Monitoring: How we Monitor from a Distance!
NCRLT has nearly 41,000 acres in conservation easement, and we are required to monitor all these properties at least once a year. So, you are probably thinking, with only two stewardship staff, how do you monitor 64 square miles spread throughout the valley and foothills of Butte, Glenn, and Tehama counites?
It’s not a fast process, and it takes us months to complete, but we can do it through in-person and remote monitoring. Remote monitoring is a fairly new form of monitoring available to land trusts, but it has been a game changer for us!
Monitoring is an essential aspect of the job for land trusts but due to a changing world, access to the land is becoming more difficult. Remote monitoring via satellite imagery allows a land trust to continue annual monitoring requirements and to track progress across all active projects even when the area is inaccessible.
Additionally, integrating remote monitoring into monitoring protocol can noticeably reduce monitoring costs, staff field time, and staff risk, while also expanding staff knowledge for each property. Remote monitoring makes it possible to monitor growth and disruptions in forests, track progress of reforestation efforts, analyze historical fires and current fire recovery, evaluate carbon projects through vegetation growth, confirm parcel data, and measure biodiversity intactness and species richness.
The natural world around us is changing rapidly and remote monitoring enables land trust staff to learn, adjust, and adapt to current conditions from year to year.
Do you want to learn more about remote monitoring and the technology we use? Have any questions you want to ask? Now is your chance! Hannah, our Stewardship Director, will be presenting on remote monitoring and land trust technology at our next Stewardship Roundtable, which will be held at Secret Trail Brewing on Friday, August 9th from 12-2pm.
Please go to: https://www.landconservation.org/events to register! This is FREE event!
We hope you will join us!
