Analysis of temporal backscattering of cotton crops using a semiempirical model

To develop an operational methodology for estimating soil moisture and crop biophysical parameters and to generate a crop cover map, backscattering signatures of vegetation canopies are investigated using multitemporal Radarsat synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data over a predominantly cotton-growing area in India during low to peak crop growth stage. A simple parameterization of the water-cloud model with volumetric soil moisture content (m/sub v/) and leaf area idex (LAI) is used to simulate the microwave backscattering coefficient (/spl sigma//sup 0/), as it is found to be a good candidate for operational purposes as demonstrated by several workers in past. The influence of crop height (H), LAI, and m/sub v/ on /spl sigma//sup 0/ is investigated during peak crop growth stage. A linear relationship between LAI and crop height is derived semiempirically, and a linear zone is chosen for analysis during the peak crop-growing stage. Estimation of average volume fraction of leaves (V~/sub l/) and attenuation factor (L) by two different approaches is discussed: 1) using linear relationship between LAI versus crop height and 2) from the water-cloud model parameter (/spl kappa/) estimation by iterative minimum least square error approach. It is observed that model-estimated parameters agree well with the measured values within an acceptable error limit. At lower soil moisture, m/sub v//spl cong/0.02(cm/sup 3//spl middot/cm/sup -3/), the dynamic range of /spl sigma//sup 0/ is found to be about +5 dB for 0-70 cm of crop height but monotonously decreases to null at a transition point, having m/sub v//spl ap/0.38(cm/sup 3//spl middot/cm/sup -3/). A positive correlation is found between backscattering coefficient and crop height till this transition point but shows a negative correlation beyond that, signifying the predominant attenuation by vegetation over soil. Differential moisture sensitivity (d/spl sigma//sup 0//dm/sub v/) of the backscattering coefficient decreases by half from 20.55 dB/(cm/sup 3//spl middot/cm/sup -3/) for dry and bare-field conditions to 10.68 dB/(cm/sup 3//spl middot/cm/sup -3/) for wet and crop-covered fields (m/sub v/=0.38cm/sup 3//spl middot/cm/sup -3/, H=70cm), whereas differential crop height sensitivity (d/spl sigma//sup 0//dH) varies from 0.22-0.03 dB/cm for bare-field conditions to crop-covered fields with crop height 70 cm. It is found that the percentage of relative error is smallest (2.27%) for LAI and attenuation factor estimation using the value of V~/sub l/, from LAI models, whereas it is 4.25% when estimating from the attenuation coefficient (/spl kappa/) from the model.