The effects of microwave fields on recombination processes, which are responsible for the optical detection of cyclotron resonance (ODCR) in 4H and 6H SiC epitaxial layers, have been investigated. We present experimental evidence indicating that the dominant mechanism of ODCR in SiC, at low temperatures and in a common range of microwave power (<200 mW), is microwave-induced lattice heating under the cyclotron resonance conditions. The results also show that at low temperatures and low microwave power the dominant scattering mechanism is impurity scattering, while carrier scattering by lattice phonons dominates under high microwave power conditions. ©1997 American Institute of Physics.