In fact once areas became dominated by human habitation or development it was no longer included in this study of natural coastal areas and processes. The opportunity for a separate study of development and human impact still remains. The aerial photographs provide an episodic record of increasing coastal development and the reduction of active agriculture on nearby lands to the east. Another important discovery is that the aerial photographic interpretation of grassy wetlands and scrub growth wetlands is truly complex along the eastern shore of Lake Ontario as seen over the last six decades. Conventional patterns of vegetative succession might lead one to expect a progression from grassy wetlands to scrub growth followed by eventual forest cover.
Some areas seem to fulfill that expectation.
However, other areas do show reversals or oscillations particularly between the grassy wetland and scrub growth appearances in the aerial photographs. It may be that in the course of a decade or more such reversing sequences of vegetative dominance occur. The total decline of vegetation and reversion back to a water body was also observed in the sequence of photographs. Areas photographed early in the growing season with both forms of growth are more likely to initially have a bushy appearance until the grasses overtop the scrub growth. Then later in the summer the six to eight foot tall wetland grasses can obscure the visual appearance of much of the lower scrub growth.