Changes in morphometric meander parameters identified on the Karoon River, Iran, using remote sensing data

River meander dynamics and mobility are important indicators of environmental change related to climate changes and anthropogenic activities at local and river basin scales. The aim of the present study is to identify morphological changes of the Karoon River in Iran using high accuracy maps and Landsat satellite images by analyses during the time period 1989–2008. In this study, 20 meandering reaches were analyzed over a 128-km-long river reach located in the middle part of the Karoon River, Iran. Morphometric indicators such as: river width (W), meander neck length (L), axis length (A), radius of curvature (R), water flow length (S), and sinuosity of meander (C) were extracted for the identified meanders. The results of a paired t-test showed that river width (W) and meander neck length (L) have significantly changed during the study period (1989–2008), with an increase of +3.5m for W and a decrease of 274m for L. Spearman correlation analysis has shown that meander parameter changes are highly correlated to each other. The parameters that do not have significant correlation together are C with W and L, W and L, and L with S and A. During the period of the study, the flow length and river sinuosity decreased for the whole river reach, by 4.77km and 0.11, respectively. Analysis of land use/land cover categories (1989 and 2008) using the support vector machine (SVM) and kernel function method served as one of the tools for interpretation of the meander parameter changes. These changes can be attributed not only to LU/LC (riparian vegetation to agriculture area ratio) but also to dam construction in the upstream part of the river that leads to major hydrological regime and sediment transfer alteration. Sediment extraction may also be an important factor.