Butte County Remotely Sensed Rice Yield Loss Mapping

Beginning in 2008, the NewFields team developed innovative methods for measuring rice crop yield loss due to cold water on 100,000 acres in California's Sacramento Valley. Measurements were developed under a settlement agreement between three rice-growing irrigation districts (Richvale Irrigation District, as well as Biggs-West Gridley and (Western Canal Water Districts) and the California Department of Water Resources, who sought accurate and efficient means to determine fair compensation for rice crop yield loss (valued between $1M and $3M/year). Yield at the irrigation inlets is reduced by cold water from the State's Oroville Reservoir. District diversions pre-dated the reservoir’s construction.

Data logs from producers' yield monitoring harvesters were used to calibrate aerial and satellite imagery, employing state-of-the-art statistical and remote sensing methods. The resulting yield maps are extremely accurate, show detailed in-field variation, and are considered a basis for establishing compensation for yield losses around field inlets. Though technically sophisticated, methods based on remote sensing offer tremendous cost and operational efficiencies relative to ground-based monitoring approaches. To our knowledge, yield maps of this extent and accuracy have never been developed, particularly in such an efficient manner.