{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,3,7]],"date-time":"2026-03-07T15:33:35Z","timestamp":1772897615916,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":47,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"9","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2022,4,28]],"date-time":"2022-04-28T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1651104000000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada"},{"name":"The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC)"},{"name":"the University of Saskatchewan"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Remote Sensing"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Differentiation of grassland\/forage types and accurate estimates of their location and extent are important for understanding their ecological processes and for applying appropriate management practices. We are aiming to reveal the different spectral characteristics of six grassland\/forage land covers in three ecoregions located in the Canadian Prairies, based on field data and satellite images. Three spectral indices representing productivity (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI)), moisture content (Normalized Difference Moisture Index (NDMI)), and plant photosynthetic activity (Plant Senescence Reflectance Index (PSRI)) were used for comparison of means, comparison of coefficient of variation (CV), and analysis of variance (ANOVA). The results indicated that different grassland types show distinguishable spectral characteristics in the Moist-Mixed and Mixed Ecoregions, while it was not possible to differentiate the classes in the Fescue Ecoregion. To further investigate the within-sites and between-sites heterogeneity, we calculated the CV in a 3 \u00d7 3 window and placed them in comparative triangles to demonstrate their potential separability. Results indicated that the triangles based on the CV offered greater class separability in the Fescue Ecoregion and in the Mixed Ecoregion.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/rs14092121","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2022,4,28]],"date-time":"2022-04-28T22:20:06Z","timestamp":1651184406000},"page":"2121","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":8,"title":["Differentiation of Six Grassland\/Forage Types in Three Canadian Ecoregions Based on Spectral Characteristics"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"14","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-1318-4158","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Thiago","family":"Frank","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Geography and Planning, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, SK S7N 5C8, Canada"}]},{"given":"Anne","family":"Smith","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Lethbridge Research and Development Centre, Lethbridge, AB T1J 4B1, Canada"}]},{"given":"Bill","family":"Houston","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Regina, SK S4M 0M3, Canada"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-2731-198X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Emily","family":"Lindsay","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON K1S 5B6, Canada"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-9428-4267","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Xulin","family":"Guo","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Geography and Planning, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, SK S7N 5C8, Canada"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2022,4,28]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"662","DOI":"10.1002\/eap.1473","article-title":"Grassland Management Impacts on Soil Carbon Stocks: A New Synthesis","volume":"27","author":"Conant","year":"2017","journal-title":"Ecol. 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