miraculix

Orchard meadows consist of high-stem fruit trees that grow scattered and at wide intervals across the landscape. Plant protection products are used only sparingly or not at all. That is precisely what makes orchard meadows such valuable habitats: they enrich our natural and cultural landscapes with immense biodiversity and help foster the local microclimate. They define the scenery and also serve as nearby recreational areas for people. 

Orchard meadows are, however, extremely threatened habitats that are classified as ‘highly endangered’ on the Red List of habitat types in many federal states. Across Germany, according to estimates by NABU, there are only around 400,000 hectares of orchard meadows remaining. Baden-Württemberg has the largest contiguous orchard meadow areas in the EU, and nearly every second orchard tree in Germany is found here. According to the most recent specialist surveys, 17% of the orchard meadow stands in Baden-Württemberg were lost within ten years. The remaining stands are partly fragmented and aging, as existing orchards are increasingly neglected.

The ‘miraculix’ project therefore focuses on new research approaches (including the detection of mistletoe) for better management and conservation, primarily through the involvement of district authorities, local authorities and private individuals.

The project investigates how different remote sensing data sources – including existing aerial image archives from state surveying offices, open geodata and newly collected multispectral and LiDAR data from UAV flights – can be evaluated and methodically integrated in a meaningful way, for example through new AI approaches, in order to develop a scalable monitoring and early warning system for orchard meadows. The focus is on the question of the extent to which the further development of mobile GIS applications and the new development of a specialist application called miraculix can create robust, practical analysis and decision-making bases for specialist authorities, advisory organisations and land users. In addition, the methodological potential of these data-driven approaches for supporting maintenance, conservation and replanting strategies, as well as for deriving municipal incentive mechanisms, such as eco-points, will be analysed. The university, districts and municipalities can expand the project topics to include public relations, education and consulting. The increased involvement of municipalities and districts through their active participation in the project is intended to set an example and send a signal to private orchard meadow owners.

The proposed workflow envisages a three-stage capture of all relevant inventory data:

1. Overarching geolocation of the scattered orchard trees within an administrative unit using orthophotos (and aerial images) that are, in part, freely available in each federal state’s geodata repositories.
2. Extraction of additional tree parameters (crown diameter, tree height) and condition metrics (deadwood ratio, mistletoe infestation, vitality, maintenance status, etc.) from aerial imagery as well as from UAV systems equipped with both RGB and multispectral cameras in combination with a LiDAR scanner.

3. Terrestrial, manual recording and ground-level inspection by walking the site at varying levels of data granularity using the SUN Mobil “miraculix” mobile application.

    

The collected inventory data are then integrated into a unified geodatabase, which serves as the basis for local, regional, or supra-regional analyses.

With the future deployment of small, lightweight, and cost-efficient UAVs along with AI-driven evaluation technologies, there are extensive opportunities to manage and preserve traditional orchard meadows more precisely and with less effort.

The primary objective of the project is the design and implementation of an innovative app solution that supports the management and maintenance of traditional orchards, thereby contributing to the preservation of the orchard landscape. Alongside this, practical and largely automated data collection and monitoring methods based on UAV flights and ground inspections are being developed and researched.

miraculix thus provides a new form of information and data delivery for specialist authorities, fruit‐growing advisors, and land users, with the involvement of civil society actors.