Citation:

Vanderhoof, M., H. Distler, M. Lang, AND L. Alexander. The influence of data characteristics on detecting wetland/stream surface-water connections in the Delmarva Peninsula, Maryland and Delaware. Wetlands Ecology and Management. Springer Science and Business Media B.V;Formerly Kluwer Academic Publishers B.V., , Germany, 26(1):63–86, (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11273-017-9554-y

Impact/Purpose:

This journal article compares the effect of resolution and source of datasets for analyzing surface water extent (inundation).

Description:

The dependence of downstream waters on upstream ecosystems necessitates an improved understanding of watershed-scale hydrological interactions including connections between wetlands and streams. An evaluation of such connections is challenging when: (1) accurate and complete datasets of wetland and stream locations are often not available and (2) natural variability in surface-water extent (SWE) influences the frequency and duration of wetland/stream connectivity. The Delmarva Peninsula in eastern Maryland and Delaware is dominated by a high density of small, forested wetlands, and therefore represents a particularly challenging environment to remotely detect wetland/stream connectivity. In this analysis wetland/stream surface water connections were quantified using two wetland datasets and three stream datasets. These included headwater streams and depressions mapped from a lidar-derived digital elevation model across the Upper Choptank River watershed within the Delmarva Peninsula. SWE was mapped across the watershed for spring 2015 using Landsat-8, Radarsat-2 and Worldview-3 imagery. We examined how input datasets influenced our interpretation of remotely-sensed wetland/stream surface-water connections. Depending on the datasets used, 12% to 60% of wetlands by count (21% to 93% of wetlands by area) experienced surface-water interactions with streams during spring 2015. This translated into a range of 50% to 94% of the watershed contributing direct surface water runoff to streamflow. This finding suggests that our interpretation of the frequency and duration of wetland/stream connections will be influenced not only by the spatial and temporal characteristics of wetlands, streams and potential flowpaths, but also by the quality and characteristics of the input datasets.

URLs/Downloads:

Record Details: