ABSTRACT
Salt marsh environments are under stress from a variety of anthropogenic processes such as sea level rise (SLR). In response to SLR, salt marshes will migrate into upland areas, drown, or persist. Accurate maps of salt marsh extent are necessary to understand where salt marsh migration, drowning, or persistence occurs. To ensure accurate maps, tidal inundation and its effect on salt marsh mapping must be understood. A combination of modeling and image verification is necessary to understand the local tidal characteristics of a location and its impact on images collected at a particular tidal stage. This chapter develops a tidal inundation model with topobathymetric LiDAR-derived bathtub models from Mean Low Water (MLW) to Mean High Water (MHW) for Cedar Island, VA. The model was compared across two DEM interpolation techniques: mean binning and maximum binning approaches. This chapter utilizes Planetscope images from the July to October of 2017 to understand the tidal inundation at a range of tidal stages and verify the inundation model. Tidal inundation is a crucial consideration both when classifying vegetation communities and conducting change analysis between different tidal stages. This chapter harnesses topobathymetric models and high resolution imagery to present two approaches for understanding tidal inundation and its potential effect on salt marsh mapping.
