Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Using Remote Sensing To Evaluate Wetland Recovery In The Northern Tampa Bay Area Following Reduction In Groundwater Withdrawals, Amor Elder

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In the past, the Northern Tampa Bay Area (NTBA) wetlands saw severe declines in hydrologic conditions due to excessive groundwater withdrawal rates. Eventually these rates were reduced to allow the wetlands to recover. To monitor this recovery, the Southwest Florida Water Management district (SWFWMD) set up a fieldwork based scoring methodology, called the Wetlands Assessment Procedure (WAP). WAP has been used in many studies of the area since groundwater withdrawal reductions; with many of those studies finding the recovery to be mixed at best. However, these studies were very limited in the number of wetlands they could assess due to …