Abstract
The Jaguaribe River drains the largest watershed of Ceara state, in northeastern Brazil, with a catchment of about 75,000 km², over 50% of the total state area. L and use and global climate changes are altering river morphology, difficulting navigation in the estuary and affecting the aquatic biota. Mapping of fluvial islands using images from the Landsat 5 satellite between 1988 and 2010 showed that the existing islands in the estuary suffered great changes during this period. Overall, there was an increase of 24.15 hectares in the islands area, which are presently colonized by mangrove vegetation. The period of largest growth occurred between 1992 and 2003 when there was an increase of 13 hectares with a rate of 2.7 ha.yr -1 . The increased rate of sedimentation in the estuary caused by land use drivers are aggravated by the decrease in river flow caused damming and the decrease in rainfall over the basin caused by global climate change.
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