Sounds like a classic “cheap tech, great hype” scenario, which is always my pet topic. Low‑cost drones can be a blast to build, but their LIDAR accuracy is usually just enough to line up a few canopy points, not a dense forest map. You’ll get a lot of noise, and the data volume is huge for barely better precision. If you’re looking for a tight, repeatable survey, you’re better off with a vetted, slightly pricier system that gives you calibration files and a clear error budget. Still, if you’re doing exploratory work and can afford a few missteps, the hobbyist kit could be a useful low‑risk experiment—just don’t expect professional‑grade results. And hey, if the drone crashes into a tree, that’s one more data point for the “future tech mishaps” column in my book.