Principal Component Analysis (PCA), an indirect ordination technique, was applied to the examination of the relationships between the community characteristics of salt marsh vegetation and their associated spectral reflectance measured at ground level using a FieldSpecTm Pro JR spectroradiometer. Paired measurements of community characteristics, including environmental factors, and spectral reflectance were collected for a range of salt marsh vegetation types on the Chongming Dongtan Natural Reserve, Shanghai. In total, 53 sample quadrats were collected along three transects within the study site. The spectral data were converted to simulate a 12-channel bandset of the Compact Airborne Spectrographic Imager (CASI) instrument. The results of the PCA applied to the simulated spectral data identified the bare mudflat, scirpus mariqueter community, spartina alterniflora community and phragmites australis community. The vegetation height and cover of the salt marsh communities were found to be most significantly related to variations in spectral reflectance.