## 3 Data  
Our classification study relied on two data types, space-based Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) and multispectral optical observations. TerraSAR-X is an advanced SAR satellite, which was launched on 15 June 2007. It has the Dual Receive Antenna (DRA) mode, transmits a radar signal using the full antenna area, and receives signal returns using two independent channels, which are divided electrically into two sections. We used TerraSAR-X quad-polarimetric data from 16 April 2010, acquired with the DRA StripMap mode. Due to the multi-polarization data acquisition, the swath width was relatively narrow and extended up to 15 km with 1.2 m in range and 6.6 m in azimuth spatial resolution. RapidEye is a satellite constellation mission, with five satellites traveling along the same orbit. Each satellite has an equally calibrated identical pushbroom sensor and provides high-resolution multispectral imagery (nadir ground sample distance: 6.5 m; orthorectified resampled pixel size: 5 m) in five optical bands corresponding to the blue visible (440-510 nm), green visible (520-590 nm), red visible (630-690 nm), red-edge (690-730 nm), and near infrared (760-880 nm) portions of the electromagnetic spectrum. The red-edge band, which is sensitive to changes in chlorophyll content [40,41],  
Figure 1: **(a)** Location of the study area in the western Everglades, shown with a Landsat ETM\(+\) image rendered as a true-color composite [39]. The frames mark the swath locations of data acquired by X-band TerraSAR-X SAR (16 April 2010) and RapidEye optical (3 December 2010) satellite. The green frame indicates the location of main study area. **(b)** RapidEye multispectral true-color composite image over the study area. **(c)** Pauli decomposition of TerraSAR-X SAR image as a color composite image: HH-VV (red), HH\(+\)VV (blue), and HV (green). is very useful for classifying vegetation types [42, 43, 44]. We used a RapidEye image collected on 3 December 2010. This image provided the best available data among RapidEye images available for this region. The image date was near the beginning of the dry season, which extends from November to May. Although the RapidEye image date preceded the date of TSX quad-pol data by five months, both datasets were acquired during the dry season under similar environmental conditions and we did not anticipate significant changes in the vegetation between the two acquisition dates. Technical details of the two datasets are described in Table 1. \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c} \hline
**TerraSAR-X** & \multicolumn{3}{c}{**RapidEye**} \\ \hline Acquisition date & 16 April 2010 & Acquisition date & 03 December 2010 \\ Wavelength & 3.1 cm & Spectral bands & \\ Carrier frequency & X-band (9.6 GHz) & Blue & 440–510 nm \\ Pulse repetition frequency & 2950 Hz & Green & 520–590 nm \\ ADC sampling rate & 164.8 MHz & Red & 630–685 nm \\ Polarization & Quad-pol & Red Edge & 690–730 nm \\ Flight direction & Ascending & Near Infrared (NIR) & 760–850 nm \\ Incidence angle & 32.6 deg & Incidence angle & 7.11 deg \\ Azimuth pixel spacing & 2.40 m & Geometric resolution & 6.5 m (resampled 5 m) \\ Range pixel spacing & 0.91 m & Dynamic range & 12 bits \\ \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table} 
Table 1: Characteristics of the TerraSAR-X (TSX) and RapidEye data used in this study. Figure 2: Photograph images obtained by the helicopter survey. (**a**) Mixed vegetation with prairie (sawgrass) and forest (mangrove); (**b**) Mixed vegetation with mostly prairie (sawgrass) and small forest (mangrove); (**c**) Scrub vegetation with short mangrove and buttonwood; (**d**) Typical mangrove dominated forest. The Florida Coastal Everglades Long Term Ecological Research (FCE-LTER) program was established by the National Science Foundation in May of 2000 in southern Florida. The FCE-LTER project provides a wealth of data and data product, including a vegetation map and digital database of South Florida's National Park [38].