Análise do comportamento espectro-temporal do Eucalipto na região do município de São Bento do Tocantins

Planted forests provide raw materials for industrial and non-industrial uses present in our daily lives (e.g. wood for construction, furniture; paper and charcoal). They also contribute to avoid deforestation of native forests, which make their monitoring important not only for production, but also for conservation purposes. In Brazil, in 2012, the area occupied with forest plantations reached 6.6 million hectares, being 77% of this amount corresponding to Eucalyptus. Scientific research that provides development of planted forest should be strengthened to meet the growing demand of this sector. Remote sensing has been used in researches, worldwide, in almost all branches of science, including forestry. However, for the adequate use of this technology for the monitoring of forest species, it is necessary first to have acknowledged about the spectral behavior of the plants to be monitored, throughout its development. In this context, this work aimed to do a multi-temporal analysis of the spectral behavior of Eucalyptus Forest, of different ages, based on the analysis of 24 OLI/Landsat-8 images acquired in the years 2013, 2014 and 2015. It was observed that the spectral response of Eucalyptus forests up to 36 months old was greatly influenced by the soil response, since the plants did not reach a size capable of covering the soil yet. The different Eucalyptus age classes presented more spectral similarity when analyzing the EVI values compared to the NDVI. The results found suggest that multi-temporal studies might benefit from incorporating information about precipitation in the analysis.