An Unvegetated to Vegetated Ratio (UVVR) for coastal wetlands of the Gulf of Mexico Coast

Prior research has shown that sediment budgets, and therefore stability, of microtidal marsh complexes scale with areal unvegetated to vegetated marsh ratios (UVVR) suggesting these metrics are broadly applicable indicators of microtidal marsh vulnerability. This effort has developed the UVVR metric using readily available satellite imagery for the coastal areas of the contiguous United States (CONUS). These datasets provide annual averages of the 1) unvegetated fraction, 2) vegetated fraction, 3) water fraction and 4) an unvegetated to vegetated ratio (UVVR) at 30-meter resolution over the coastal areas of the contiguous United States for the years 1985-2023. Additionally, multi-year average values of vegetated ratio, its standard deviation and a UVVR based on the annually-averaged vegetated ratio are provided for the coastal wetlands of the contiguous United States.