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NOTE: "Percentage of red coloration" refers to the amount of red in a specific color, typically <br /> expressed as a percentage within a color model like IIG.D.(Red Green Blue) <br /> or ,IMYM1.G,(Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black) <br /> So, basically, as a plant is healthier it has a higher NIR and if a plant is less healthy it would <br /> have a lower NIR and it would look redder, that kind of brown affect that you see. And <br /> so, basically as you see, when you have a drought, plants are going to browner, and you're <br /> not going to have as much vegetation. When you have good water year plants are going <br /> to be greener, and that is going to be really strong correlate to the Mamane pod <br /> availability and thus the Palila breeding success and population. So, over the last several <br /> I guess 2 decades now, in this paper they looked at the NDVI* or that vegetation <br /> index...and so,you look at the monthly vegetation health index over the last several years, <br /> you can see in the early 2000, there was some fluctuation, but it was overall, there was a <br /> little bit of a drought in the early 2000 after the 90's, after the late 1990's and it kind of <br /> part...and you got a little bit more water, coming in at the end of 2004 and from 2004 to <br /> 2014 it was a continuous decline in plant health. Then in 2014 we got more precipitation <br /> up there, and since then it's remained pretty stable. And what seems to be one of the <br /> key numbers are, oh yeah sorry, I'm getting a little ahead of myself...so we've had pretty <br /> good conditions on the mountain for the last several years. I did pull more recent data, <br /> and as we all know it's been very dry this summer and we're getting pretty close to some <br /> of the danger level that we saw between 2005 and 2009, 2014..sorry...It's starting to be a <br /> little more concerning up there, I'm hoping we get some moisture here. But one thing <br /> that's getting interesting is even so if we've had good conditions in early 2000 and 2004 <br /> and worst conditions in 2005 and 2009, but you can see this little patch of forest kind of <br /> that Northeast section by Mana'o that is still maintain a pretty healthy condition. And <br /> that seems to be mostly in response to fog drip. So, a lot of you know spend time on <br /> Mauna Kea it would get really misty up certain areas, and this little section right... by Pu'u <br /> Mana'o tends to get a lot more cloud cover then the rest of the mountain. So, that's the <br /> current theory for why that is proven to be more healthy or proving to have more healthy <br /> vegetation, even in really dry conditions and it tracks as well to see that's where the Palila <br /> is spending a significate portion of their time, based off our survey data. This kind of <br /> show...or tracks drought severity index so, you can see in the late 1990's we were coming <br /> out of a drought and in the 2000 we were in a drought and the early 2000 to 2014 were <br /> pretty severe drought conditions, and now we kind of hovering just out of drought since <br /> 2014 to 2025. 2025 we're dropping back into drought conditions. And then, one other <br /> thing, ...I'll highlight later...sorry...Key take away from this paper as vegetation health <br /> declined from late 2004 to 2013, the drought prevails in 74% of months from 2000 to <br /> 2005 to 2011, excuse me...really, really rough time for the mountain, particularly for <br /> Palila. The two worst droughts in the last century here, occurred in 2007...occurred <br /> 12 <br />