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Modesto, California

Almond country on the Tuolumne, with the biggest floodplain restoration in the state.

Stanislaus County is almonds, walnuts and dairies from the Coast Range to the Sierra foothills, run on two irrigation districts that also sell the power, and the Tuolumne River through Modesto is where California's largest floodplain restoration is being planted. Orchard planning and restoration baselines are the flights that fit.

Talk to Eli All of California

The ground

Modesto and Stanislaus County

Modesto sits on the Tuolumne where it crosses the valley floor to meet the San Joaquin west of town, with the Stanislaus River to the north and the Merced to the south, all three coming off the Sierra through reservoirs the districts own. The county is orchards nearly wall to wall, dairies between them, and the Dos Rios ranch at the rivers' meeting is being turned back into floodplain forest at a scale nowhere else in the state has tried. The foothills to the east are oak and range toward the Stanislaus National Forest.

Who buys mapping here

  • City of Modesto: Parks, Recreation and Neighborhoods and the urban forestry program, Public Works, Utilities, the GIS group; Turlock, Ceres, Oakdale, Riverbank
  • Stanislaus County: Public Works, Parks and Recreation, the Office of Emergency Services, the Agricultural Commissioner
  • Modesto Irrigation District and Turlock Irrigation District, with their canals, reservoirs and power lines
  • The Tuolumne River Trust, River Partners and the Dos Rios restoration partners
  • The East Stanislaus Resource Conservation District and the groundwater sustainability agencies of the subbasin
  • California State University, Stanislaus and Modesto Junior College's agricultural programs
  • The Stanislaus National Forest and the foothill fire safe councils
  • Almond, walnut and dairy operations across the county, and the processors with land to manage

Getting there

From Medford

Six and a half hours south on Interstate 5 and Highway 99; Modesto pairs with Stockton on the northern valley trip.

The public lidar

What exists, and what it misses

The county and the state have flown the rivers and the valley floor for flood and groundwater work. An orchard block's replant plan, a dairy's drainage, a restoration planting counted tree by tree in its first years or a river reach after a flood each need a current flight at the field or the reach, which the valley surface cannot give.

What we would fly

The lanes that fit Modesto

Three dimensional view of a farm elevation model with fields, tree mounds, and the pond in relief.
Farm Planning
Post harvest assessment map for the Oregon Department of Forestry: downed woody debris volume by decay class in one acre cells, with species of standing trees.
Forestry
Orthomosaic of a creek corridor through Phoenix, Oregon, clipped to the project area.
Property
Infrared heat map over a lake and forest: heat perimeter, isolated heat points classed by temperature, and 50, 100, and 200 foot mopup buffers.
Wildland Fire

Every service

Everything we do, in Modesto

  • Farm planning Start here

    Terrain, drainage low points, slope and sun, canopy, and plan overlays drawn on a current orthomosaic of the whole farm.

  • Rivers, riparian and habitat Start here

    Species along a river corridor, wetlands and habitat, cold water seeps found with thermal, and baselines for restoration work.

  • Tree inventory and canopy Start here

    Every crown in a city, a park system or a campus, with height, species and health, checked against trees on the ground.

  • GIS consulting and data

    Hosted data, web maps and dashboards, Survey123 field apps, scripted reporting, and the cleanup of the data you already have.

  • Drone LiDAR

    Bare earth under the canopy, contours, surface and canopy height models, classified point clouds and line corridors, PPK controlled and checked.

  • Forestry

    Stand inventory, species and health classes, downed woody debris counted and measured from the air, post harvest monitoring.

  • Wildfire fuels and CWPP support

    Canopy height, ladder fuels and structure exposure for a Community Wildfire Protection Plan, citywide when the plan needs it.

  • Night infrared on active fires

    Heat perimeters and hotspots in the incident team’s hands before the morning briefing. The pipeline that builds the package runs at the UAS Wildland Fire Collaborative, the nonprofit we founded.

  • Property and site design

    Design ready contours, tree points and surface models, in the formats and coordinate system the engineer specifies.

  • Multispectral imaging

    Five calibrated bands, vegetation indices, and species and health classification with its accuracy reported.

  • Thermal infrared

    A calibrated temperature in every pixel, flown as a mapping mission: fire heat classified in degrees, prescribed fire mortality, cold water seeps.

  • Federal and agency work

    Fire infrared, LiDAR on abandoned mine lands and forest data for federal land managers. Registered in SAM.gov.

Nearest work

Stanislaus County is still ahead of us. What fits it from Oregon: a planting corridor counted at year one, the Talent nursery plan, and a river reach mapped species by species.

Overview of the Bear Creek corridor through Phoenix from the June 2025 LiDAR: the greenway, the creek, and the highway with the young planting in place.

Property 2025

A planting corridor through Phoenix, tree by tree

City of Phoenix

The year one record for 98 trees the city planted where the Almeda fire burned through Phoenix, from drone LiDAR and RGB flown 65 days after planting.

Read the case
Three dimensional overview of the farm elevation model draped over the landscape.

Farm Planning 2023

A farm plan on real ground

Plant Oregon with Oregon Urban Rural and Community Forestry, a tree nursery in development

Terrain, ponds, tree mounds, and a site plan drawn on a current ortho of the whole farm.

Read the case
Riparian canopy polygons drawn as coloured outlines by dominant species over a true colour orthomosaic of a river corridor.

Forestry 2025

Riparian species and cold seeps on the Scott River

Cascade Stream Solutions, with a botanist leading field identification. We flew it as their subcontractor and reported to them.

Fourteen riparian species classified across 423 acres of river corridor, with thermal mapping that pointed to groundwater fed cold seeps.

Read the case

The record

Every project we have published

Forestry and trees

Rivers and habitat

Wildfire fuels and planning

Night infrared on fires

Terrain and site design

Farm planning

Modesto and the Tuolumne.

An orchard block, a dairy, a restoration reach or a city canopy count. Tell us the ground and the season and Modesto rides with Stockton on the trip.

Talk to Eli

Email info@roguerecon.net or call 808 298 6290.