Change detection of land cover in Meighan wetland using remote sensing technique

Nowadays, monitoring the wetlands land-use change trends using satellite images is one of the most important tools for managing and conserving wetlands. The goal of this study was to investigate land cover change in Meighan wetland as a remarkable wintering wetland for water birds and waders in the middle of the country during 2008-2018 in order to evaluate the trend of the changes in this wetland and make managers prompt a proper decision for the effective management. In this study, images of the geo-referenced Landsat satellite, ETM+, OLI 8 TRIS were used and after applying necessary corrections on the images, results were analyzed in the ENVI 5.4 software. The results of the change detections indicated that the area of the wetland has decreased by 63.31% during the study period. Vegetation covers of the wetland diminished by 64%. During the study period, barren lands have increased by 11.6%. Also, the area of agricultural land in the border of the wetland has expanded by 23.15%. Besides, reviewing water birds and waders abundance in 2008 and 2018 showed that abundance of the most families of water birds and waders were higher in 2008. Taking the environmental importance of Meighan wetland into account as a place hosting large populations of water birds and waders, we recommend that management plans to survey and systematically control of this wetland should be implemented.