Untangling the confounding effects of urbanization and high water level on the cover of emergent vegetation in Cootes Paradise Marsh, a degraded coastal wetland of Lake Ontario

An approach based on a digital elevation model (DEM) was used to untangle the confounding effects of long-term water-level fluctuations and increasing human population on the cover of emergent vegetation in Cootes Paradise Marsh, a degraded coastal wetland in Lake Ontario, Canada. Data for 20 observations between 1934 and 1993 were used in the analysis. First, we calculated the inundated area based on the DEM, a derived measurement that …