Mapping Kelp Forests with Landsat Imagery

        Landsat imagery has never before been used to map kelp forests in Alaska. For my internship with National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in Homer, Alaska, I created my internship project around determining the utility of this method in the geography. I used Kachemak Bay as the sample site. Kachemak Bay as up to 28 ft tides and determining at what point in the tide kelp was best viewed from the surface was my first task. I developed a program to sort through Landsat metadata and locate scenes acquired within 2 hours of low tide. 

         The next portion of my task was to process a scene. I used the color-infrared bands, a land mask, a curbing the stretch type histogram to view the kelp. Developing these methods took lots of research and trial and error. 

         I am currently working to expand this research and methods on a multitude of areas and time periods. This project exemplifies my ability to create and execute a project and work independently. I worked and developed this project individually. With a complete lack of knowledge of remote sensing but with a passion for kelp forests and data visualization, I was able to learn and understand all processes necessary to complete this project. 

        I plan to continue my research with NOAA and this project until 2022 under mentorship from Kris Holdereid. I also would like to thank Russ White, from the Cal Poly GIS hub, with his guidance on processing the imagery.