Little research has been directed toward determining the status and ecological role of riparian areas in agricultural landscapes of the Willamette Valley, Oregon. A research project has been designed to contribute to the development and evaluation of alternative future scenarios and to improve the basic understanding of the role of riparian areas on the ecological condition of small, perennial streams in agricultural landscapes of the Willamette Valley. The objectives of the research are: (1) to quantify relationships between riparian attributes at varying spatial scales and stream ecological condition, and (2) to estimate the influence of selected riparian area-agricultural configurations on the indicators of stream ecological condition. To address these objectives, remotely-sensed imagery (aerial photography and thematic mapper satellite imagery) will be used to quantify land cover at multiple spatial scales (i.e., stream reach, stream network, watershed), from which riparian vegetation function, land use stressor, and stream network structure indicators (i.e., potential explanatory variables) are derived for 41 study watersheds.