For my research, I use annual Landsat satellite images to view the Willamette River to examine disturbances and loss in the valley’s wetlands. I also have several other critical data sets including a LiDAR inundation raster based on a 2 year flood return interval and several shapefiles showing the location of mitigation wetlands. One of the spatial problems I’d like to investigate in this class involves relating the data sets to each other; one of the ecological questions I’m asking through my research involves investigating the spatial distribution of wetlands created and restored through mitigation versus those destroyed and disturbed. For example, do the two differ in their proximity to the river and its tributaries? Is one more clumped/distributed than the other?

Utilizing the spatial statistics toolbox, specifically regression and mapping trends/clusters, may help me answer some of these questions.

Some of my annual satellite imagery viewed in Tasseled Cap Index: