An assessment of pans as landscape features in the north west province using remote sensing techniques.

Abstract

Pans are unique as wetlands in that they are shallow endorheic basins whicn display marked fluctuations in water depth and duration. They are significant sites of local ecological diversity and particularly, an essential habitat for aquatic avifauna. In a review of pans as landscape features, pan morphology, initiation and propagation mechanisms and functioning as wetlands are discussed The first step in building an inventory and classification of wetlands is the location of sites. Satellite imagery is ideally suited to mapping broad level land cover and landuse. In this study Landsat TM data and image processing techniques are employed to locate pans of differing sizes, morphology and vegetation structure in a panfield,' in the North West province. With the Landsat TM data available for this study it was possible to determine the location and type, the surface extent of pans, whether or not they contained vegetation and to what extent across their surfaces, and whether they contained water. It was not possible with the vintage of Landsat™ data used to determine the plant communities associated with the pans from spectral signatures of the vegetation.