Clifford Montagne

Mapping wetlands and riparian areas using Landsat ETM+ imagery and decision-tree-based models

The location and distribution of wetlands and riparian zones influence the ecological functions present on a landscape. Accurate and easily reproducible land-cover maps enable monitoring of land-management decisions and ultimately a greater understanding of landscape ecology. Multi-season Landsat ETM+ imagery from 2001 combined with ancillary topographic and soils data were used to map wetland and riparian systems in the Gallatin Valley of Southwest Montana, USA. Classification Tree Analysis (CTA) and Stochastic Gradient Boosting (SGB) decision-tree-based classification algorithms were used to distinguish wetlands and riparian areas from the rest of the landscape. CTA creates a single classification tree using a one-step-look-ahead procedure to reduce variance. SGB uses classification errors to refine tree development and incorporates multiple tree results into a single best classification. The SGB classification (86.0% overall accuracy) was more effective than CTA (73.1% overall accuracy) at detecting a variety of wetlands and riparian zones present on this landscape.

Change detection of wetland ecosystems using Landsat imagery and change vector analysis

Accurate, efficient, and repeatable mapping of changes in wetlands and riparian areas (referred to collectively as wetlands) is critical for monitoring human, climatic, and other effects on these important systems. We used Landsat-based satellite imagery from 1988 and 2001 to map changes in wetland ecosystems in the Gallatin Valley of southwest Montana. Stochastic gradient boosting (SGB) was used to classify the 2001 image, and change vector analysis (CVA) was used to identify locations where wetland areas might have changed between 1988 and 2001. These potentially changed locations again were classified for the 1988 Landsat image using SGB. Areas of change constituted 3.4% of the study area, thus only this small percentage of the image was reclassified for the 1988 image. Overall change detection accuracy was 76%, although changes along the periphery of wetland boundaries and in areas of smaller upland inclusions were not distinguished as well as other changes. Overall accuracies of the SGB wetland classification maps were 81% for 1988 and 86% for 2001. CVA significantly reduced the number of pixels involved in the historical image classification compared to conducting independent classifications, thus reducing the potential for compounding classification errors in unchanged areas.

A Dietary Risk Assessment for Indigenous Consumption of Natural Salt Deposits in the Darhad Valley, Northern Mongolia

ABSTRACT The nomadic herding population of the Darhad Valley, in northern Mongolia, collects and utilizes a salt precipitate, called hujir, which develops at the saline system, Tohi. This culturally important indigenous dietary supplement is consumed daily as an ingredient in a salty milk-tea and because of its essential micro- and macronutrients it is a beneficial and necessary part of their daily diet. Despite its benefits, there are increasing health concerns among the Darhad people as a result of consuming hujir. Therefore, we conducted a dietary risk assessment. Consumption rates were obtained from interviews with nomadic herders of the valley and a chronic exposure assessment was completed using chemical analyses on hujir samples. A combination of chronic toxicity threshold values, dietary reference intake recommendations, and drinking water guidelines were used to estimate dietary risks related to hujir consumption. Exposures to arsenic, fluoride, and nitrate were as high as 33, 1.2, and 1.3 times the chronic oral reference dose, respectively. Exposures to antimony, arsenic, and lead were 1.7, 19, and 14 times the drinking water guidelines, respectively. Given these results, additional studies are needed to better understand possible health effects associated with hujir consumption in the Darhad population, especially for arsenic.

Listening Over Power Lines: Students and Policy Leaders

This chapter explores how a rarely used channel in agricultural classrooms—one linking students to policy leaders—can significantly benefit both groups through a two-way flow of knowledge and ideas. Establishing and then building such “power line” connections between grass roots and grass tops is proving powerful in promoting mutual learning—learning that can occur when students are given the chance to interact with leaders who typically are older, not on campus, and are variously experienced with and responsible for guiding programs that are relevant to classroom discussions. And while it may sound pat, it is surely true: The complexity of opportunities and challenges of current and future food security requires listening across such disparate stakeholder communities. Such bridges are first-step requisites to problem solving.

Couples Counseling: Native Science and Western Science

In this chapter, we compare and contrast Native Science and Western Culture Science and explore the contributions that Native Science can make to Western Culture Science. Case Study #1 is an example of the intertwining of understanding Native Science with Western Culture scientific training on the part of food scientists. Case Study #2 is about Indigenous knowledge (IK) that is well known among entomologists, but little known among early childhood nutrition scientists. Case Study #3 explores the perceptions of the academe to Native Science and its produce, Indigenous knowledge. The message is urgent: Native Science and Western Science need to go into “marriage counseling” as soon as possible. Native Science needs to learn self-respect and self-empowerment. On the other hand, Western Science needs to learn patience, respect for other ways of knowing, including a rigorous use of a continuous feedback loop incorporated into a time frame of multi-generational repetition..

Listening Within a Bioregion

In this chapter we will take you to Mongolia. Your guide will be Cliff Montagne who will introduce you to a diverse cast of characters in two geographically similar BioRegions but culturally vastly different. These characters come together in the story in such a way over two decades as to create a teaching and learning environment that engages participants in the food and agricultural sciences, together with health. This whole becomes thoroughly tangled and pressed together with culture like a piece of felt.

Decolonization and the Holistic Process

Food insecurity and insidious diseases like malaria can be solved. We have the technology, but without the skills to bridge the cultural gap, conventional technology will not transfer. In this chapter, we present the most difficult of the cultural technologies: decolonizing methodologies and the holistic process. Just as good pipetting techniques are necessary to conduct PCR and microarray studies, these cultural technologies require specific skills: careful, active listening, patience; and development of an ethno-relative world view. We have now seen the gap and explored its impact globally and in specific locations in Chapter 2, Failures. As agricultural scientists and policy makers, and as citizens of the Earth, we have responsibility for the 2 billion people in food insecure households throughout the world. This includes 40% of children in West Africa who suffer from physical and cognitive stunting because they are subsisting on a grain-based diet without their traditional, nutritionally dense snacks—grasshoppers and locusts. In East Africa, with an attempt to alleviate hunger, crop scientists pushed farmers of Kenya to switch from traditional grains to corn-based diets, deficient in two essential amino acids, lysine and tryptophan. The result today is malnourishment across sub-Saharan Africa because we have nudged these peoples to abandon traditional sources of essential amino acids and micronutrients. Because we, food and agricultural scientists, are responsible for this tragedy, we also have some responsibility for the 450,000 children who will likely die this year from cerebral malaria due in part to their compromised innate and adaptive immune systems caused by the inadequate content of these amino acid and other micronutrient deficiencies in these children’s diets. We are now recognizing how including cultures’ role in our learning process as scientists, policy makers, and citizens, we can bridge the gap and contribute to solving these issues.