Monitoring report of old growth forests changes in the Ukrainian Carpathians for February-March 2022

In February-March, experts of the NGO "ForestCom" continued to monitor old growth forests based on satellite images. In modern conditions, monitoring based on Sentinel-2 and Sentinel-1 satellite images is the most suitable as the composite of Sentinel-2 optical images was inappropriate for monitoring due to the snow cover in the mountains(Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. Composite of February-March Sentinel-2 satellite images for monitoring. Areas of old growth forests are marked in red.

For monitoring, 1,099 plots with an area of 12,120.1 ha have been determined, which is 70.1% of the total number of accepted old growth forests. Monitoring is carried out by visual analysis with the accuracy as far as the resolution of radar images allows, that is, selective cuttings of low intensity cannot be determined with the help of such information. Based on such analysis, no violations of the forest cover were detected in the inspected areas.

Fig. 2. Areas of old growth forests (red color) on the synthetic radar image for February-March 2022.

*Old growth forests - in the meaning, as it is introduced in the Law of Ukraine that includes three categories: virgin, quasi virgin, and natural forests - https://zakon.rada.gov.ua/laws/show/2063-19/conv#Text