Andrew Strassman
Andrew is involved in the management of the vegetation mapping program at UMESC and actively works to document vegetation in the field and interpret aerial imagery to the finest scale of the U.S. National Vegetation Classification (USNVC) for vegetation mapping projects.
Andrew Strassman conducts studies on:
- General Ecology
- Vegetation Classification
- Vegetation Mapping
- Integration of GIS-based datasets and decision making into active ecological management
Science and Products
Using sUAS to monitor and survey regeneration and recruitment in areas of forest canopy loss
We have lost thousands of hectares of floodplain forest canopy in the Upper Mississippi River System (UMRS) since 2019, but are we losing the forest? In areas lacking regeneration or regeneration of desired species, what can this tell us about where these landscapes are headed? We know floodplain forests are in trouble in the UMRS, impacted by non-native invasive and weedy native species, changes...
Aerial Camera System Boresight Development and Deployment
Plane-mounted aerial camera systems are used across the U.S. Department of the Interior for science, resource monitoring, emergency management, and disaster recovery, among many other applications. A critical step in deploying aerial cameras is calibrating these systems to ground control points (GCP). This allows the camera systems, when combined with photo rectification software, to precisely...
A Decision-Support Tool for Invasive Plant Management Under Fluctuating Great Lakes Water Levels
Water levels in the Great Lakes are fluctuating in ways that we have not seen in the past, with both historically low- and high-water levels occurring in the last decade. Expectations are that larger and more frequent water-level fluctuations will occur in response to climate change. The increased variability in lake levels has implications for the management of invasive plants found in the coasta
2020 Systemic Land Cover/Land Use Aerial Imagery Acquisition, Image Interpretation, and Spatial Data Products for the Upper Mississippi River System
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) Upper Mississippi River Restoration (UMRR) program, through its Long Term Resource Monitoring (UMRR-LTRM) element, is completing the 2020 decadal update of Land Cover/Land Use (LCU) for the entire Upper Mississippi River System (UMRS). Dissemination of the 2020 LCU database will provide a fourth systemic dataset to compare to the 1989, 2000, and 2010/11...
Forest Canopy Gap Dynamics: Quantifying Forest Gaps and Understanding Gap-level Forest Regeneration
Floodplain forest is a major and critical component of the Upper Mississippi River System (UMRS). The current and future condition of floodplain forest on the UMRS is receiving increased attention from managers as the forest appears to be declining and not regenerating. A primary concern is invasive reed canarygrass ( Phalaris arundinacea ), Dutch elm disease ( Ophiostoma ulmi and O. novo-ulmi )...
U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service - Comprehensive Conservation Plan
The Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) has been entrusted to manage our nation’s critical wetland resources. Due to conversion in industrial, residential, and agricultural uses, these wetlands have been disappearing at an alarming rate over the last one-hundred years. In order to better care for these resources, all of the refuges are developing long-term Comprehensive Conservation Plans (CCP).
Vegetation Mapping at National Parks
This project aims to provide a research tool enabling the National Park Service to better manage their resources for the betterment of the American public. Data sets developed by this program provide a structure for framing and answering critical scientific, planning, and management questions about vegetation communities and park natural resources and their relation to environmental processes...
Science and Products
Using sUAS to monitor and survey regeneration and recruitment in areas of forest canopy loss
We have lost thousands of hectares of floodplain forest canopy in the Upper Mississippi River System (UMRS) since 2019, but are we losing the forest? In areas lacking regeneration or regeneration of desired species, what can this tell us about where these landscapes are headed? We know floodplain forests are in trouble in the UMRS, impacted by non-native invasive and weedy native species, changes...
Aerial Camera System Boresight Development and Deployment
Plane-mounted aerial camera systems are used across the U.S. Department of the Interior for science, resource monitoring, emergency management, and disaster recovery, among many other applications. A critical step in deploying aerial cameras is calibrating these systems to ground control points (GCP). This allows the camera systems, when combined with photo rectification software, to precisely...
A Decision-Support Tool for Invasive Plant Management Under Fluctuating Great Lakes Water Levels
Water levels in the Great Lakes are fluctuating in ways that we have not seen in the past, with both historically low- and high-water levels occurring in the last decade. Expectations are that larger and more frequent water-level fluctuations will occur in response to climate change. The increased variability in lake levels has implications for the management of invasive plants found in the coasta
2020 Systemic Land Cover/Land Use Aerial Imagery Acquisition, Image Interpretation, and Spatial Data Products for the Upper Mississippi River System
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) Upper Mississippi River Restoration (UMRR) program, through its Long Term Resource Monitoring (UMRR-LTRM) element, is completing the 2020 decadal update of Land Cover/Land Use (LCU) for the entire Upper Mississippi River System (UMRS). Dissemination of the 2020 LCU database will provide a fourth systemic dataset to compare to the 1989, 2000, and 2010/11...
Forest Canopy Gap Dynamics: Quantifying Forest Gaps and Understanding Gap-level Forest Regeneration
Floodplain forest is a major and critical component of the Upper Mississippi River System (UMRS). The current and future condition of floodplain forest on the UMRS is receiving increased attention from managers as the forest appears to be declining and not regenerating. A primary concern is invasive reed canarygrass ( Phalaris arundinacea ), Dutch elm disease ( Ophiostoma ulmi and O. novo-ulmi )...
U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service - Comprehensive Conservation Plan
The Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) has been entrusted to manage our nation’s critical wetland resources. Due to conversion in industrial, residential, and agricultural uses, these wetlands have been disappearing at an alarming rate over the last one-hundred years. In order to better care for these resources, all of the refuges are developing long-term Comprehensive Conservation Plans (CCP).
Vegetation Mapping at National Parks
This project aims to provide a research tool enabling the National Park Service to better manage their resources for the betterment of the American public. Data sets developed by this program provide a structure for framing and answering critical scientific, planning, and management questions about vegetation communities and park natural resources and their relation to environmental processes...