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How to Use CIR Imagery to Identify Cattails

Color Infra-Red imagery allows you to see the heat levels in a photograph. Since most CIR photos are aerial, you can use CIR imagery to identify landscape features based on the level of heat. To find cattail beds, you have to make inferences based on the nature of CIR imagery and the biology of cattails. Vegetated areas have certain characteristics that alter their appearance in CIR photos. Cattails in particular have certain habitats that you can identify by cross-referencing the CIR photo with an ordinary aerial photograph.

Things You'll Need

CIR aerial photograph
Ordinary aerial photograph

Instructions

- 1
  Identify riparian zones using the ordinary aerial photograph. A riparian zone is characterized by the presence of water surrounded by dense vegetation, which is the natural habitat for cattails. Cattails grow in standing water and can grow in isolated spots along the course of a creek or river.
- 2
  Identify shallow waters around the edges of lakes and ponds, where cattails usually grow. While riparian areas are usually associated with running water, the areas around lakes and ponds may host cattails if they are shallow enough. If the water in certain areas of the pond is lighter in color in the ordinary photograph, then there are shallows there.
- 3
  Identify high-heat areas using the aerial photograph. Areas with live vegetation are generally hotter than the surrounding landscape, as the vegetation gives off moisture which traps in heat. Vegetated shallows and riparian zones are even hotter than vegetation on dry land.
- 4
  Examine the CIR photograph looking for areas that are deep red in color, which might indicate the presence of cattails. Ordinary forest will be pinkish or light red. Small strips of deep red next to bodies of water are a dead giveaway.

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