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ARS Home » Plains Area » Las Cruces, New Mexico » Range Management Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #334300
Title: Two new mobile apps for rangeland inventory and monitoring by landowners and land managers

Author
item Herrick, Jeffrey - Jeff
item Karl, Jason
item MCCORD, SARAH - New Mexico State University
item BUENEMANN, MICHAELA - New Mexico State University
item RIGINOS, CORINNA - University Of Wyoming
item Courtright, Ericha
item Van Zee, Justin
item GANGULI, AMY - New Mexico State University
item ANGERER, JAY - Texas A&M University
item BROWN, JOEL - Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS, USDA)
item KIMITI, DAVID - New Mexico State University
item SALTZMAN, RICK - Consultant
item BEH, ADAM - New Mexico State University
item Bestelmeyer, Brandon

Submitted to: Rangelands
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 12/28/2016
Publication Date: 4/1/2017
Publication URL: http://handle.nal.usda.gov/10113/5625867
Citation: Herrick, J.E., Karl, J.W., McCord, S., Buenemann, M., Riginos, C., Courtright, E.M., Van Zee, J.W., Ganguli, A., Angerer, J., Brown, J.R., Kimiti, D., Saltzman, R., Beh, A., Bestelmeyer, B.T. 2017. Two new mobile apps for rangeland inventory and monitoring by landowners and land managers. Rangelands. 39:46-55. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rala.2016.12.003.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rala.2016.12.003

Interpretive Summary: Opportunities for rangeland inventory and monitoring have been transformed by innovations in both indicator and methods standardization and new technologies. These technologies make it easier to collect, store, access and interpret inventory and monitoring data. The Land-Potential Knowledge System (LandPKS) platform and apps help users with little or no soils information to describe their soil, and for those with little botanical knowledge to monitor key changes in species composition. The system also allows users to easily share and compare their data with others.

Technical Abstract: Rangeland inventory and monitoring have been transformed during the past 10 years by a number of major innovations. This paper reviews the status of two new mobile apps (LandInfo and LandCover) that are part of a larger “Land-Potential Knowledge System” (LandPKS) that is being developed to capitalize on these four innovations in order to provide the knowledge and information needed to make land use and land management decisions at individual field, pasture, or ecological site scales. It focuses specifically on the opportunities to use these apps to support inventory and monitoring by landowners and land managers. The apps can be used to collect data that is compatible,and in many cases entirely consistent with the BLM's Assessment, Inventory and Monitoring, and the NRCS's National Resources Inventory program. Other featuresinclude one-time data entry and permanent cloud storage on a web portal and data visualization tools.