Vegetation Trend Analysis for Southwestern Australia 1990-2021

Landgate's Vegetation Trend product provides statistical summaries of vegetation density change in southwestern Australia's agricultural zone. It analyzes Landsat-derived vegetation index data across two time periods: 1990-current year and the last decade. The multiband image file contains measures like mean, linear trend, quadratic trend, and standard deviations to assess vegetation stability.

Use Cases

• Analyze linear trend and quadratic trend coefficients to model long-term vegetation growth or decline patterns in the agricultural zone.
• Compare mean vegetation index values with residual standard deviation after fitting linear trend to identify areas of stable versus volatile vegetation health.
• Use the statistical summaries of mean and standard deviation about mean to map regions with consistently high or low vegetation density over the 1990-2021 period.
• Highlight areas with different patterns of change by visualizing the combined statistical measures for the Land Monitor vegetation index.

Strengths

• Provides analysis for two distinct time periods: a long-term series from 1990 and a recent decade.
• Derived from the Land Monitor Landsat-based vegetation index, a specific metric for vegetation density.
• Contains multiple statistical measures per location, including trend analysis and deviation metrics.

Limitations

• Spatial coverage is limited to the southwestern agricultural zone only, not statewide or national.
• Data is delivered as a multiband image file (WMS) and service formats, not a tabular dataset, requiring GIS expertise for analysis.
• The underlying Land Monitor index is noted to be more confidently applied only in this specific region.

Provenance

Source

Landgate, the Western Australian government land authority.

Collection Method

Calculated from annual Landsat imagery using the Land Monitor vegetation index (red band + short wave infrared band 1).

Time Range

1990 to the current year, with a focus period on the last 10 years.

Freshness

Updated to the current year, with product metadata last updated in March 2026.

Geography

Southwestern agricultural zone of Western Australia.