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IAPRS & SIS, Vol.34, Part 7, “Resource and Environmental Monitoring”, Hyderabad, India, 2002 
MULBERRY CROP ACREAGE AND GARDEN CONDITION ASSESSMENT BY USING 
MULTI-TEMPORAL SATELLITE DATA 
K. Ashoka Reddy1, R.S.Mallikarjunappa2, P.P. Nageswara Rao3, , 
B.K. Ranganath3 and H.Honne Gowdal 
1. Karnataka State Remote Sensing Applications Centre, GOK Bangalore — 560 052 
2. Karnataka State Sericulture Research & Development Institute, Thalaghattapura , Bangalore - 5600 62 
3. Regional Remote Sensing Service Centre, Bangalore — 560 070 
KEYWORDS: crop, assessment, extraction, data, growth, identification, 
ABSTRACT: 
Sericulture is a multidimensional, export-oriented cottage industry. It is a labour intensive industry and involves a wide spectrum of 
activities like mulberry cultivation, silkworm egg preparation, silkworm rearing, silk weaving, etc. Season-wise information on 
mulberry crop, their acreages, vigour and green leaf biomass production enables the State Department of Sericulture to plan for 
suitable measures in estimating the requirement of disease free layings (DFLs) and to forecast the likely arrivals of cocoons in the 
market which helps in regulating the market prices so as to give assured remunerative prices to the farmers. 
The study was carryout in Sidlaghatta taluk of Kolar District, Karnataka where the concentration of the mulberry crop was high. 
Digital analysis of satellite data involving supervised classification was performed to identify and discriminate mulberry crop and 
other land cover categories. The accuracy has been evaluated by collecting wall to wall ground truth information survey number 
wise, in a cluster of six villages of Sidlaghatta taluk and its comparison with remote sensing based figures. 
The vegetation index (VI) values were extracted from the mulberry crop was observed to be ranging from 0.10 to 0.49, which were 
related to different growth stages of mulberry crop. The VI values from 0.1 to 0.2, 0.21 to 0.35 and 0.36 to 0.49 corresponds to 
pruning / early, growing and matured stages respectively. A relative deviation of -8.9 % was observed between satellite based 
estimates and ground truth observations. In view of small and fragmented fields of mulberry, the high resolution satellite data was 
found to be more suitable for identification and delineation of mulberry crop. Advanced estimation of leaf biomass was carried out 
for each of the condition/ stage with the assumption that from the irrigated row system of mulberry about 2800 kg leaf / crops / acre 
can be obtained. The satellite data of higher resolution are more useful in mulberry area estimation and assessing vigour of crop. 
Temporal data ensures higher percentage of reliability and facilitate monitoring the growth cycle and quantum of biomass being 
generated in a given area over a period of time. The capabilities of the remote sensing technology in providing information regularly, 
synoptic, multi-spectral, multi-temporal coverage and are playing major role in providing such information needed for sericulture 
development. 
INTRODUCTION 
Sericulture is an agro based, labour intensive, commercial 
section is an important occupation which not only mitigates the 
dissertation of cultivation but alleviates the poverty and helps 
in increasing the standard of living and changes the life styles 
of the agrarian rural, small and marginal farmers. Karnataka is 
one of the premier silk producer contributing to 65% of silk 
production in the country. 
Due to erratic behavior of monsoons, the dry land crops 
like cereals, pulses, oil seeds etc. are not fetching remunerative 
prices and many times a total failures, which puts the farmers 
into a debt trap. The gradual shift by small and marginal 
farmers to mulberry cultivation and silk rearing has brought 
about economic stability and credit worthiness among the dry 
land farmers. 
Mulberry, a perennial crop with improved and local varieties 
having a wide adaptability can be grown very well in light to 
medium textured soils in all the ten agroclimatic zones of the 
state. However, because of wide fluctuations in the prices of 
cocoon in the market at times reaching the lowest ebb. There is 
a dire need to correlate relationship between the availability of 
green mulberry leaves (biomass) and approximate requirement 
of Disease Free Layings (DFLs) and to forecast the likely 
353 
arrivals of cocoons in the market which helps in regulating the 
market prices so as to give assured/remunerative prices to 
farmers. Synoptic coverage and repetivity of satellite data, 
enables to monitor the growth cycle and quantum of biomass 
being generated in a given area over a period of time by using 
temporal and historical data. Timely and accurate information 
on the acreage of mulberry garden condition assessments and 
biomass assessment are required far the development of 
sericulture sector. 
An attempt has been made to study the appreciation potential of 
high resolution satellite data from IRS 1C for mulberry acreage 
and garden condition assessment in Siddlagatta taluk of Kolar 
district in Karnataka. Digital analysis of satellite data involving 
supervised classification was performed to identify and 
discriminate mulberry growth stages and other round cover 
categories. 
The accuracy has been evaluated by collecting wall to wall 
ground truth information, Survey number wise, in six villages 
of Siddlagatta taluk and its comparison with remote sensing 
based figures.  Acrelative deviation of 8.9% was observed 
between satellite based estimates and ground truth observation. 
The remote sensing base study have been established in order 
to estimate the acreage biomass and cocoon production of at