Mapping wetland biomass with three remote sensors
Monday, May 5, 2014 at 5:57PM Byrd, K.B., J.L. O'Connell, S. Di Tommaso, and M. Kelly. 2014. Evaluation of sensor types and environmental controls on mapping biomass of coastal marsh emergent vegetation. Remote Sensing of Environment 149: 166-180
One of our biomass maps, this one from Mayberry slough
We modeled biomass of emergent vegetation with field spectrometer and satellite data from Landsat, Hyperion and WorldView-2 sensors. Use of narrowbands did not significantly improve biomass predictions over broadbands. Water inundation interacting with plant structure controlled biomass model accuracy. Shortwave infrared bands and multi-temporal datasets improved biomass prediction. These types of maps will track Blue Carbon, sea level rise and land use effects in coastal marshes.
Key words: emergent vegetation, hyperspectral sensor, field spectroscopy, multispectral sensor, water inundation, Blue Carbon, wetland management, error reporting.