Land-cover mapping using multitemporal, dual-frequency polarimetric SAR data

The Danish Center for Remote Sensing (DCRS) is, in collaboration with the Danish mapping agency, conducting a study on topographic mapping using SAR data, and land cover mapping results are presented. The Danish EMISAR system (an L- and C-band, fully polarimetric, airborne SAR) have in 1994 to 1999 during the growing season acquired a lot of data over a Danish agricultural site. The data acquisitions were co-ordinated with ground surveys to obtain a detailed land cover map. The test area contains a large number of different land cover classes, such as more than 10 different crop types, deciduous and coniferous forest types, wetlands, lakes, and urban areas. The data are used to study the classification potential of polarimetric SAR data using the Wishart distributed covariance matrix.