Development of methodology for automated determination of forest parameters based on data from unmanned aerial vehicles

The article provides a scientific investigation of the processing of UAV data on forest lands in Russia's European North taiga. A technique for automatic identification of tree crowns, computation of forest parameters is discussed using the trial plot as an example. The methodology incorporated morphological methods for processing digital images, geographic information tools for expressing and processing spatial data, and the findings of top forestry experts' statistical observations. The methodology may be used to automatically analyse orthorectified aerial images with a resolution of 5 to 10 cm/pix. The studies discussed in this text were conducted on images in Russia's northern European region. The findings of the study are utilized to automate the update of information on forest resources on a regular basis.