Rapid and accurate monitoring of aquatic vegetation is crucial for the protection and management of lake ecosystems. In this study, the Nanji Wetland National Nature Reserve and Poyang Lake National Nature Reserve were selected as study areas.First,the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index(NDVI) was used to separate water bodies,Then, the Normalized Difference Mud Index(NDMI) was constructed to eliminate the interfernce of mudflats on vegetation classification.Next,floating-leaved plants and emergent plants are distinguished based on differences in the backscattering coefficient within the radar imagery.Finally, this study compared the proposed method with existing methods for distinguishing these two types of aquatic vegetation. The results show that:(1) The method based on backscattering coefficients for distinguishing floating-leaved plants from emergent plants achieved a significant improvement in overall accuracy compared to existing methods. The overall classification accuracy of this method was 89.72%, with a Kappa coefficient of 0.8413.(2) For remote sensing images from different periods, the overall classification accuracy of our method was consistently above 80%, demonstrating good stability and reliability.(3) Our method effectively excluded the interference of mudflats on vegetation classification, thereby avoiding the misclassification of exposed mudflats after water recession. It is particularly suitable for floodplain wetlands with large water level fluctuations.In summary,the method developed in this study provides a new technical approach for distinguishing between floating-leaved and emergent plants and offers a reference for monitoring different types of aquatic vegetation.