A polygon shapefile of bottomland vegetation cover and geomorphic features of the Escalante River, Utah mapped from 1951/1960 aerial imagery

We used the 1951/1960 historical imagery of the Escalante River, Utah in ArcGIS to quantify channel area and average width and quantify woody riparian vegetation cover in two reaches of the river. Reach 1 was approximately 15 river kilometers (rkms) long and located between Sand and Boulder creeks within Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument. For Reach 1 we used the earliest available imagery which was from 1960. Reach 2 was approximately 16 rkms in length, extending from the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area boundary to just upstream of Choprock Canyon. For Reach 2 the earliest imagery was from 1951. We delineated the extent of active channel. Active channel was defined as the portion of the channel free of vegetation. We [...]