Waterlettuce (
Pistia stratiotes
L.) is a free-floating exotic
aquatic weed that often invades and clogs waterways in the
southeastern United States. A study was conducted to evaluate
the potential of using remote sensing technology to distinguish
infestations of waterlettuce in Texas waterways. Field
reflectance measurements showed that waterlettuce had
higher visible green reflectance than associated plant species.
Waterlettuce could be detected in both aerial color- infrared
(CIR) photography and videography where it had
light pink to pinkish-white image tonal responses. Computer
analysis of CIR photographic and videographic images had
overall accuracy assessments of 86% and 84%, respectively. (PDF contains 6 pages.
