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Observation of crop development
For the documentation and optimisation of the plant production it can be important to conduct a continuous monitoring of the crop development over the whole vegetation period. Often it is not possible, though, to cover big areas with many fields with in-field measurements to check the canopy development. Through the usage of satellite data which are available several times per year the phenological development can be observed continuously over the whole vegetation period for all fields.
- Which field is maturing early?
- Are there fields where crop growth develops negatively?
- When does ripening of the canopy start?
- What yield is to be expected?
Such a crop monitoring can be helpful e.g. for sugar beet factories to plan and estimate their campaigns.
Fig. 1: Satellite images with sugar beet fields and their visible phenological development over the growth period
Fig. 2: Diagram of the development of the biomass (Green Biomass Index)
using the example of three sugar beet fields over one growth period
Monitoring of individual fields is done via a derivation of 
Canopy Parameters, like e.g.
- Development of leaf area index
- Development of biomass
- Fraction of brown leaves / maturity level
- Heterogeneity of the canopy within one field
- Classification of outliers in comparison to other fields