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© 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

The characterization of water level fluctuations is crucial to explain the hydrological processes that contribute to the maintenance of the structure and function of wetlands. The aim of this study was to develop a method based on remote sensing to characterize and map the water level variation patterns, evapotranspiration, discharge, and rainfall over wetlands in the Gravataí River basin, Rio Grande do Sul (RS), Brazil. For this purpose, ground-based measurements of rainfall, water discharge, and evapotranspiration together with satellite data were used to identify the apparent water level based on the normalized difference water index (NDWI). Our results showed that the variation of the water level followed the rainfall, water discharge, and evapotranspiration seasonal patterns in the region. The NDWI showed similar values to the ground-based data collected 10 days prior to satellite image acquisition. The proposed technique allows for quantifying the pattern of flood pulses, which play an important role for establishing the connectivity between different compartments of wetlands in the study area. We conclude that our methodology based on the use of satellite data and ground measurements was a useful proposition to analyze the water level variation patterns in an area of great importance in terms of environmental degradation and use of agriculture. The information obtained may be used as inputs in hydrologic models, allowing researchers to evaluate the impact, at both local and regional scales, caused by advance of agriculture into natural environments such as wetlands.

Details

Title
A Remote Sensing-Based Method to Assess Water Level Fluctuations in Wetlands in Southern Brazil
Author
Simioni, João P D 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Guasselli, Laurindo A 1 ; de Oliveira, Gabriel 2   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Mataveli, Guilherme A V 3   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; dos Santos, Thiago V 4   VIAFID ORCID Logo 

 Center for Remote Sensing and Meteorology, Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, RS 91501-970, Brazil; [email protected] (J.P.D.S.); [email protected] (L.A.G.) 
 Department of Geography and Planning, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 3G3, Canada 
 Department of Geosciences, Federal University of São João del-Rei, São João del-Rei, MG 36307-352, Brazil; [email protected] 
 Embrapa Agricultural Informatics, Campinas, SP 13083-886, Brazil; [email protected] 
First page
20
Publication year
2020
Publication date
2020
Publisher
MDPI AG
ISSN
2624795X
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
2656384130
Copyright
© 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.