Monitoring shrimp farming development from the space: A RS and GIS approach in Kandleru creek area, Andhra Pradesh, India
Results and discussions
The present study encompasses an area of 256.64 km
2 that covers the major part of Kandleru creek area where the dramatic changes of landuse or land cover can be found along with mushrooming of shrimp farms. Digital interpretation of all those data have identified 9 major landuse or land cover types in the study area (Table 2, Figure 2). The shrimp farms have been presented in two classes corresponding to active shrimp farms and dry shrimp farms according to the differences in spectral characteristics revealed during the classification technique.
Table 2: The landuse classes selected or discerned from the satellite data used.
| (SF) Active shrimp farms or shrimp farms with water | (Sveget) Small vegetation (grass field and agriculture field) |
| (Dry SF) Harvested shrimp farms without water or drying of shrimp farms during pond preparation | (B_soil) Barren soil (basically without vegetation) |
| (S_bar) Sand bar created in the creek mouth | (Mangr) Mangrove Forest |
| (WtrB) Water bodies (creek, reservoirs other than active shrimp ponds) | (Unclass) Unclassified lands |
| (Forest) Terrestrial forest other than mangroves, agriculture fields and grasslands | |
The spatial location as well as the mushrooming of shrimp farms captured by LISS-III and PAN data revealed some interesting observations. During 1988 to 2001 new shrimp farming areas along the Kandleru creek have been increased 82%. About 50% of these new shrimp farms have been identified in small vegetation and agriculture area. Other 34% were identified in areas, which were mangrove in 1988. The study also revealed that mangroves along the Kandleru creek have been deteriorated 72% by different land use activities. About 22% mangroves were encroached by shrimp farming whereas 50% mangroves were cleared and converted into small vegetation and agricultural lands. A total of 1218 ha new shrimp farming area in 2001 has been derived from areas, which were previously small vegetation and agriculture lands in 1988 (Table 3, Figure 4). Whereas 835 ha new shrimp farming area has been derived from mangrove area. Disturbed mangrove forest and regular patches of shrimp farms are abundant in all along the creek. The landuse or lands cover classes with distributed area derived in 1988 and 2001 are presented in Table 3.
Table 3: Individual landuse class with encompassing area (ha) identified through processing and interpretation of LISS-II (1988) and LISS-III (2001) images.
| Land use classes | Total area (ha) |
| | LISS-II (1988) | LISS-III (2001) |
| SF | 539.57 | 936.04 |
| Dry SF | - | 2017.92 |
| S_bar | 22.8 | 24.98 |
| WB | 3230.14 | 2582.48 |
| Forest | 4928.98 | 4371.48 |
| Sveget | 11194.81 | 12067.31 |
| B_soil | 1853.09 | 2604.20 |
| Mangr | 3708.88 | 1046.84 |
| Unclass | 186.01 | 13.03 |