Assessing Rice Sheath Blight Disease Habitat Suitability at a Regional Scale through Multisource Data Analysis

Abstract

Extensive occurrence of rice sheath blight has been observed in China in recent years due to agricultural practices and climatic conditions, posing a serious threat to rice production. Assessing habitat suitability for rice sheath blight at a regional scale can provide important information for disease forecasting. In this context, the present study aims to propose a regional-scale habitat suitability evaluation method for rice sheath blight in Yangzhou city using multisource data, including remote sensing data, meteorological data, and disease survey data. By combining the epidemiological characteristics of the crop disease and the Relief-F algorithm, some habitat variables from key stages were selected. The maximum entropy (Maxent) and logistic regression models were adopted and compared in constructing the disease habitat suitability assessment model. The results from the Relief-F algorithm showed that some remote sensing variables in specific temporal phases are particularly crucial for evaluating disease habitat suitability, including the MODIS products of LAI (4–20 August), FPAR (9–25 June), NDVI (12–20 August), and LST (11–27 July). Based on these remote sensing variables and meteorological features, the Maxent model yielded better accuracy than the logistic regression model, with an area under the curve (AUC) value of 0.90, overall accuracy (OA) of 0.75, and a true skill statistics (TSS) value of 0.76. Indeed, the results of the habitat suitability assessment models were consistent with the actual distribution of the disease in the study area, suggesting promising predictive capability. Therefore, it is feasible to utilize remotely sensed and meteorological variables for assessing disease habitat suitability at a regional scale. The proposed method is expected to facilitate prevention and control practices for rice sheath blight disease.