Annual NDVI dynamics observed in industrial tomato grown in the south of Ukraine

Abstract

Pavlo Lykhovyd*, Raisa Vozhehova and Sergiy Lavrenko

NDVI is widely used in crop production in the context of precision agriculture and geoinformation systems. The purpose of the study was to determine the seasonal variation pattern of the spatial vegetation index of industrial tomato crops grown in southern Ukraine. The data on the NDVI values of the crop during the study period 2016-2021 were collected on One Soil AI platform, combining Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 imagery the index determination. The tomato fields, which were analysed in the study, located in different regions of Kherson and Mykolaiv regions (Ukraine), and included regular spring and late summer tomato plantations. As a result, the genuine annual NDVI dynamics was established that is helpful for the identification of tomato crops by spatial monitoring. Connecting the values of the vegetation index to the crop phenology revealed that each phenological phase has its individual range of NDVI values. The highest NDVI values were recorded in the phase of fruit formation, while the lowest were recorded in the planting phase and at the period from fruit ripening to maturity. The results of the study provide novel insights on the annual pattern in NDVI dynamics on tomato and could be implemented in the crop mapping and crop differentiation systems