The comparison between remotely-sensed vegetation indices of Meteosat second generation satellite and temperature-based agrometeorological indices for monitoring of main crops in the northeast of Iran

The main crops of northeast region of Iran are grapes and apples, which in this research we compared the fourteen remotely sensed vegetation index from MSG1(IODC) satellite with several temperature-based agrometeorological indices of which comparative results in this article can be generalized to similar climatic regions. The agrometeorological indices and parameters used in the present article are the heating unit, the photothermal unit, the vapor pressure deficit, the photo-temperature, Nycto-temperature, and the cumulative precipitation. Also, remotely sensed vegetation indices are NDVI, MSAVI, PVI, SAVI, SR, MSR, RDVI, NLI, RVI, GEMI, DVI, MNLI, SR × NDVI, and SR × SAVI. In this article, the values of agrometeorological and remotely sensed vegetation indices in two understudy regions, i.e., Bojnourd and Shirvan were compared, and the correlation coefficient between two mentioned coordinates was calculated. The time series charts of these indices for vineyards and apple orchards have shown an unanticipated oscillation with continuous high and low values, whereas the agrometeorological indices increase, remotely sensed vegetation indices raising. There is no specific relationship between cumulative precipitation and remote sensing indices in apples, as the trees in the study area are irrigated. The maximum R2 coefficient belongs to the NDVI, MSR, SAVI, and MSAVI. In the final, due to the high correlation of the NDVI with the agrometeorological indices, for verification, the NDVI product of the MODIS (MOD13C1) and MET8 (MSGNDVD) is used. Thus, these four indices can be used as parallel or alternative monitoring of temperature-based agrometeorological indices.