Western Australia Woody Vegetation Cover Since 1988

Western Australia's state-wide vegetation cover dataset provides annual classifications of perennial woody vegetation from 1988 onward, derived from Landsat imagery with 30-meter ground pixels. Landgate produces the data, classifying vegetation into forest and sparse woody categories based on cover density and height thresholds.

Use Cases

• Analyze long-term trends in forest category coverage to monitor changes in areas meeting the 20% cover density and 2m height threshold.
• Map the distribution of sparse woody vegetation category to identify regions with 5-20% vegetation cover.
• Integrate annual classifications with other spatial data to assess land use change impacts on woody perennial vegetation.

Strengths

• Annual time series provides consistent data starting from 1988, enabling longitudinal analysis.
• State-wide spatial coverage offers a complete picture of Western Australia's woody vegetation.
• Classification uses a defined structural requirement (20% cover, 2m height) for the forest category, ensuring consistency.

Limitations

• Data resolution is limited to 30-meter ground pixels from Landsat, which may not capture fine-scale vegetation patterns.
• Classification is binary (forest and sparse woody), lacking more detailed vegetation type or species information.
• The dataset focuses solely on perennial woody vegetation, excluding other land cover types.

Provenance

Source

Landgate

Collection Method

Derived from Landsat satellite imagery.

Time Range

1988 to present

Freshness

Updated annually; last metadata update was March 2026.

Geography

State of Western Australia