This article is published in cooperation with the XIIIth International Terroir Congress November 17-18 2020, Adelaide, Australia. Guests editors: Cassandra Collins and Roberta De Bei

Currently, the greatest challenge for vine growers is to improve the yield and quality of grapes by minimizing costs and environmental impacts. This goal can be achieved through a better knowledge of vineyard spatial variability. Traditional platforms such as airborne, satellite and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) solutions are useful investigation tools for vineyard site specific management. These remote sensing techniques are mainly exploited to get the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), which is useful for describing the morpho-vegetational characteristics of vineyards. This study was conducted in a vineyard in Tuscany (Italy) during the 2017, 2018 and 2019 seasons. Ground data were acquired to detect some agronomic variables such as yield (kg/vine), total soluble solids (TSS), and pruning weight (kg/vine). Remote sensed multispectral images acquired by UAV and Sentinel-2 (S2) satellite platform were used to assess the analysis of the vegetative variability. The UAV NDVI was extracted using both a mixed pixels approach (both vine and inter-row) and from pure canopy pixels. In addition to these UAV layers, the vine thickness was extracted. The aim of this study was to evaluate both classical Ordinary Least Square (OLS) and spatial statistical methods (Moran Index-MI and BILISA) to assess their performance in a multi-temporal comparison between satellite and ground data with UAV information. Good correlations were detected between S2 NDVI and UAV NDVI mixed pixels through both methods (R2 = 0.80 and MI = 0.75). Regarding ground data, UAV layers showed low and negative association with TSS (MI = - 0.34 was the lowest value) whereas better spatial autocorrelations with positive values were detected between UAV layers and both yield (MI ranged from 0.42 to 0.52) and pruning weight (MI ranged from 0.45 to 0.64). The spatial analysis made by MI and BILISA methodologies added more information to this study, clearly showing that both UAV and Sentinel-2 satellite allowed the vigour spatial variability within the vineyard to be detected correctly, overcoming the classical comparison methods by adding the spatial effect. MI and BILISA play a key role in identifying spatial patterns and could be successfully exploited by agricultural stakeholders

Satellite Data to Improve the Knowledge of Geohazards in World Heritage Sites

According to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) agency, the World Heritage Sites (WHS) inscribed in the World Heritage List (WHL) must be safeguarded with an adequate protection system, in order to guarantee their integrity and authenticity. Currently, many UNESCO sites are threatened by geohazards, but the safeguard of these sites does not seem to be wide-ranging. Looking at the standard list of factors affecting the Outstanding Universal Value (OUV) of WHS, which has been adopted by the World Heritage Committee in 2008, it seems that only “sudden geological events” are considered as factors that undermine the protection of the properties. Furthermore, it is well known that slow-kinematic phenomena can also threaten cultural and natural heritage. This study proposes a satellite InSAR-based procedure to identify and monitor the temporal and spatial evolution of ground deformation related to slow-kinematic geohazards (slow-moving landslides and ground-subsidence). This procedure, applied in this work on the Tuscany Region (Italy), simplify the InSAR products interpretation, making them easily exploitable by the local WHS managers for long-term geohazards monitoring and conservation strategies. These activities, thanks to the main characteristics of the recent Sentinel-1 data (short revisit time, free availability without any restrictions and worldwide coverage), can be defined for each UNESCO site of the world

Produzioni etrusche in ‘pietra fetida’ nell’Etruria settentrionale: materie prime e loro provenienza

Gli scavi di numerosi siti etruschi della Toscana sud-orientale hanno restituito sculture funerarie realizzate con un particolare tipo di calcare tenero chiamato ‘pietra fetida’ a causa del caratteristico odore che essa rilascia quando viene percossa. La mancanza di informazioni di dettaglio sulle ragioni per le quali gli Etruschi abbiano frequentemente utilizzato questa pietra, e sulle potenziali aree estrattive della stessa, hanno suggerito uno studio petrografico di questa roccia che ne chiarisca la natura ed i possibili luoghi di estrazione. La ‘pietra fetida’ è una roccia calcarea tenera, porosa e leggera, di colore beige e grana finissima, caratteri che ne permettono un facile riconoscimento. La sua originaria deposizione sarebbe da collocarsi nella Toscana meridionale durante la fase di regressione marina del Pliocene inferiore, in zone costiere al limite tra l’ambiente marino e quello continentale. Ciò sembra confermato dalla presenza di resti fossili di organismi di acqua dolce o salmastra come Ostracodi (Cyprideis) ed oogoni di Characeae . Questo litotipo talvolta viene citato come ‘sasso porco’ o, più impropriamente, come ‘tufo puzzolo’, ‘lapis suillus’, ‘stink stone’ ed infine ‘etruscite’ per l’ampio impiego che ne fecero gli Etruschi per la realizzazione di sculture, sarcofagi, cippi e urne cinerarie. Nel secolo scorso studi geologici dedicati alla stratigrafia e alla tettonica dei sedimenti pliocenici della Toscana meridionale, hanno consentito di individuare affioramenti di litotipi riconducibili alla ‘pietra fetida’ variamente associati a lignite, conglomerati, sabbie, argille e calcari organogeni, nei pressi di Chiusi, Montefollonico, Petroio, San Quirico d’Orcia e Pienza. Proprio per le sue caratteristiche di resistenza e di facile lavorabilità anche nei dettagli scultorei, questo tipo di pietra è stata utilizzata per la realizzazione di sculture anche di notevoli dimensioni; tra queste la più nota è la Mater Matuta, conservata nel Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Firenze. La ‘pietra fetida’ è stata utilizzata in gran parte per la realizzazione di sarcofagi e di urnette, alcune delle quali decorate a rilievo e spesso dipinte, mentre i materiali provenienti da stratificazioni sottili, quindi non adatte a ricavarne manufatti di grandi dimensioni, sono state usate per realizzare piccoli oggetti, tra i quali numerose basi per statuette in metallo. Manufatti etruschi in ‘pietra fetida’ sono attestati in una vasta area compresa tra Chiusi, Sarteano, Chianciano Terme e Pienza, ma sono stati rinvenuti anche in altri siti etruschi tra cui Murlo, Montalcino, S. Quirico d’Orcia, S. Giovanni d’Asso e Trequanda in provincia di Siena, oltre a quelle di Cortona e Pieve a Socana in provincia di Arezzo

Determination of Riparian Vegetation Biomass from an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV)

The need to rely on accurate information about the wood biomass available in riparian zones under management, inspired the land reclamation authority of southern Tuscany to develop a research based on the new remote sensing technologies. With this aim, a series of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) flight campaigns flanked by ground-data collection were carried out on 5 zones and 15 stream reaches belonging to 3 rivers and 7 creeks, being representative of the whole area under treatment, characterized by a heterogeneous spatial distribution of trees and shrubs of different sizes and ages, whose species’ mix is typical of this climatic belt. A careful preliminary analysis of the zones under investigation, based on the available local orthophotos, followed by a quick pilot inspection of the riverbank segments selected for trials, was crucial for choosing the test sites. The analysis of a dataset composed of both measured and remotely sensed acquired parameters allowed a system of four allometric models to be built for estimating the trees’ biomass. All four developed models showed good results, with the highest correlation found in the fourth model (Model 4, R2 = 0.63), which also presented the lowest RMSE (0.09 Mg). The biomass values calculated with Model 4 were in line with those provided by the land reclamation authority for selective thinning, ranging from 38.9 to 70.9 Mg ha−1. Conversely, Model 2 widely overestimated the actual data, while Model 1 and Model 3 offered intermediate results. The proposed methodology based on these new technologies enabled an accurate estimation of the wood biomass in a riverbank environment, overcoming the limits of a traditional ground monitoring and improving management strategies to benefit the river system and its ecosystems