Wyoming Riparian Vegetation Inventory
Using Remote Sensing and Other Geospatial Data:
Phase II-High Resolution Imagery Sources

This is the second part of a two-phase project. Phase I estimated riparian vegetation for the state of Wyoming using stratified random sampling of moderate satellite resolution (30-m) imagery. Phase II of the project was to refine Phase I riparian estimates by sampling high resolution digital imagery. Four key conclusions resulted from the Phase II study. First, estimates developed from high resolution imagery are superior to the moderate resolution imagery. Second, there is no difference between 1-meter NAIP, 1-meter CIR DOQ’s and 0.7-meter CIR aerial photography; while a dot grid spacing of 24 to 32-meters yielded stable estimates with a reasonable amount of interpretation time. Third, while different thresholds and more intensive processing were necessary, the 10-meter DEM was superior to the 30-meter DEM. Fourth, different land cover (e.g., forest cover) and land use types (e.g. irrigation fi elds) require different valley bottom delineations to improve the sample effectiveness of dot grid sampling.