MAPPING THE VEGETATION COVER AND HABITAT CATEGORIZATION OF MADURU OYA AND HORTON PLAINS NATIONAL PARKS USING LANDSAT 8 (OLI) IMAGERY TO ASSIST THE ECOLOGICAL STUDIES

Abstract

Availability of accurate and detailed vegetation and habitat maps is an essential requirement in the modern ecological studies. Geo-referenced vegetation maps of Sri Lanka’s protected areas are scarce and only a handful of maps are available with detailed vegetation patterns. Since majority of the current ecological research work takes place within the protected area network of the island, we identified that preparing updated maps to assist the ecologists as well as the park management is highly important. In this study we developed vegetation and land cover maps for Maduru Oya and Horton Plains national parks in Sri Lanka. The procedure was based on supervised classification of Landsat 8 multispectral image data. Classification was complemented by ground truth data obtained through field surveys. The present study generated accurate (overall accuracy - 92-93%; Kappa – 0.89) and detailed vegetation/land cover maps and habitat types were proposed based on vegetation patterns. The results provide accurate information for ecologists and decision-makers to assist future research work as well as conservation and management of protected areas concerned.