Vineyard identification and characterization based on texture analysis in the Helderberg Basin (South Africa)

In this paper, a methodology for the spatial identification and characterization of vineyards using texture analysis is proposed to meet the need of ongoing and further viticultural “terroir” studies. The proposed method is based on the maximization of a criteria that deals with the coefficients enclosed in the different bands of a wavelet decomposition of the original image. More precisely, we search for the orientation that best concentrates the energy of the coefficients in a single direction. For each texture pattern, a degree of anisotropy and the angle of the main orientation is extracted. The methodology is validated on aerial-photographs in the Helderberg Basin (South Africa). The degree of anisotropy is a reliable information able to discriminate vineyards to other land-uses. Moreover, the row orientation turns out to be a relevant information for all applications related to mesoscale atmospheric modeling in vineyard areas.