In spring 2022, Dunea removed all sea buckthorn bushes in a number of dune valleys to give characteristic vegetation another chance. On behalf of the Province of South Holland, the development of the vegetation here will be monitored for four years. Aquila Ecology is carrying out this monitoring with the application of Artificial Intelligence. In the field, 3000 photos of the vegetation are taken with a high-resolution camera with GPS three times a year. Each photo covers about 1m2. With that, almost all dune valley vegetation around two seepage ponds was captured on image (Fig. 2). Each picture is then cut into about 100 pieces by the software and each piece is analysed separately by an AI model (Fig. 3). The software automatically compiles a dataset, which includes the GPS tags, recognised plant species and their cover for each photo. In this project, Aquila Ecology is also investigating how well the AI can determine plant communities from the photo. The results of the first year are promising. It seems that AI can be used well for monitoring vegetation. It is also clear that the special flora of dune valleys are returning along the monitored banks. These include species such as Marsh Helleborine, Flesh-coloured orchid and Parnassia. The AI model also recognised a species that, until this year, had not been noticed in the Frog Valleys, the Green-winged orchid (Fig. 4). Whether this species has emerged because of the measures or had been present for some time we cannot say. In any case, the fact that it is there now is good news for the Frog Valleys.
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