Tracking changes in the canopy density of mangroves, Digital Earth Australia (DEA) Mangrove Canopy Cover reveals how these extraordinary trees may be responding to sea level rise, severe tropical cyclones, drought, climatic cycles, changing temperatures and large storm events.
Mangroves provide a diverse array of ecosystem services but these are impacted upon by both natural and anthropogenic drivers of change. In Australia, mangroves are protected by law and hence the natural drivers predominate.
It is important to know the extent and canopy density of mangroves in Australia so that we can measure how mangroves are responding to sea level rise, severe tropical cyclones and climatic cycles.
This product provides valuable information about the extent and canopy density of mangroves for each year from 1987 for the entire Australian coastline.
The canopy cover classes are:
20-50% (pale green)
50-80% (mid green)
80-100% (dark green)
The product consists of a sequence (one per year) of 30 m resolution maps that are generated by analysing the Landsat fractional cover developed by the Joint Remote Sensing Research Program and the Global Mangrove Watch layers developed by the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency.
This product is the result of a collaboration between Geoscience Australia, the University of Aberyswyth, CSIRO, the Joint Remote Sensing Research Program and the Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network.
