Evaluation of Land Use Land Cover Changes in Palleru (K-11) Sub Basin of River Krishna Using GIS and NDVI

In the present study, Palleru sub basin (K-11) has been considered for the evaluation of land use land cover changes. Ten rain gauge stations were identified in and around the study area and accordingly the sub basin was divided into ten sub areas namely Palakurthy, Kodagandla, Torrur, Tungaturthy, Aravapally, Maripeda, Noothankal, Atmakur, Kushmanchi and Mothey based on Thiessen polygon network. The land use/land cover classification was made based on Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) with two scenes in a year. The areal extent of bare soil was computed as 26.16 sq km and 372.03 sq km for the years 2000 and 2002 respectively in the Rabi season and 87.73 and 182.82 sq km for the years 2000 and 2002 respectively in the summer season. Bare soil increased by 345.87 sq km and 95.09 sq km in Rabi and summer seasons respectively. The areal extent of fallow lands with bushes decreased from the year 2000 to 2002 with respect to Rabi and summer seasons due to limited rainfall in the year 2002. However, the cropped area did not register much difference. The areal extent of water bodies in Rabi season was estimated as 198.83 sq km and 92.57 sq km for the years 2000 and 2002 respectively. The decrease in water spread area from the year 2000 to 2002 was due to corresponding decrease in rainfall in the study area from 920mm to 556 mm. Similarly, the areal extent of water bodies in summer season was estimated as 22.74 sq km and 18.27 sq km for the years 2000 and 2002 respectively.