Multi-Branch Channel-Gated Swin Network for Wetland Hyperspectral Image Classification

Hyperspectral classification of wetland environments remains challenging due to high spectral similarity, class imbalance, and blurred boundaries. To address these issues, we propose a novel Multi-Branch Channel-Gated Swin Transformer network (MBCG-SwinNet). In contrast to previous CNN-based designs, our model introduces a Swin Transformer spectral branch to enhance global contextual modeling, enabling improved spectral discrimination. To effectively fuse spatial and spectral features, we design a residual feature interaction chain comprising a Residual Spatial Fusion (RSF) module, a channel-wise gating mechanism, and a multi-scale feature fusion (MFF) module, which together enhance spatial adaptivity and feature integration. Additionally, a DenseCRF-based post-processing step is employed to refine classification boundaries and suppress salt-and-pepper noise. Experimental results on three UAV-based hyperspectral wetland datasets from the Yellow River Delta (Shandong, China)—NC12, NC13, and NC16—demonstrate that MBCG-SwinNet achieves superior classification performance, with overall accuracies of 97.62%, 82.37%, and 97.32%, respectively—surpassing state-of-the-art methods. The proposed architecture offers a robust and scalable solution for hyperspectral image classification in complex ecological settings.