Hi everyone. I’m a consulting forester. I’m looking to find some technology to help with boundary work.
As a forester, we often mark boundaries on parcels, especially before any harvesting takes place. Our current system relies on having a survey for the property to establish bearings between corners. We use a compass to establish flagging along the line, and connect the points. This often takes several attempts to get a straight line, and sometimes certain areas seem to cause errors in the compass reading. It’s a slow process, and without a survey, reestablishing a long boundary line is impractical.
We’re hoping to purchase something we can use in the forest to mark locations of corners, upload that information to a computer, and use software to allow us to figure a bearing. What would be icing on the cake is if the device could pair to a smart phone and tell us when we’re precisely on the line, once we have the shapefile created.
I’d appreciate recommendations on an RTK, as well as software to utilize the information. I’m really not familiar with these types of tools, and if what I’m looking to do isn’t a practical fit for these tools, I’d like to know that as well!
We have a lot of options, most of them have “RTK” in their product title…essentially all can pair with phone apps (we recommend SWmaps as a free option)
Are you wanting an all-in-one solution? If you comfortable with some setup it can be a lot less expensive to create your own base and rover setup
What is the environment like where you are? You mention forest, is there canopy cover? If so, that will greatly impede GPS/GNSS signals
Thanks Russell. Indeed we work under canopy cover very often. If the system worked as a base station and rover, the base station could probably almost always be positioned somewhere clear of tree cover.
We would be open to suggestions for either an all-in-one unit or a base and rover package.
Since a forester will have the deed, take a look at the following post. I think your use-case fits this well.
Once a RTK site calibration is performed, you will know exactly where you are in relation to the parcel in real time, to within an inch (depending on canopy obviously).
IE: Any SparkFun RTK device (with Bluetooth), a smartphone, PointPerfect, and SW Maps.
These days, there’s not many applications where a Base/Rover is worth it (if you have internet access).