Mesic Landscape Persistence reflects how reliably a location supported productive vegetation during the late growing season (July 15 through September 30) from 1984 to 2025. Each year, a pixel is classified as productive if its greenness index (NDVI) meets or exceeds a standard threshold for mesic vegetation (0.3). Persistence is the percentage of those years a pixel was productive — a proxy for long-term water availability.

What is mapped? This layer maps all vegetation within valley bottom areas or riparian wetlands, including willows, cottonwood, and other woody plant species. Outside of riparian corridors, mapping of mesic landscapes captures herbaceous vegetation in springs, seeps, and meadows after excluding trees.

Min Years Productive sets the minimum persistence threshold for visible pixels. The lowest meaningful value is 2% (approximately one productive year). For example, setting this to 25% shows only locations that were productive in at least 1 out of 4 years, filtering out rarely-wet areas.