Climatic Warming and Humidification in the Arid Region of Northwest China: Multi-Scale Characteristics and Impacts on Ecological Vegetation

The climatic warming and humidification observed in the arid region of Northwest China(ARNC) and their impacts on the ecological environment have become an issue of concern. The associated multi-scale characteristics and environmental responses are currently poorly understood. Using data from satellite remote sensing, field observations, and the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 6, this paper systematically analyzes the process and scale characteristics of the climatic warming and humidification in the ARNC and their impacts on ecological vegetation. The results show that not only have temperature and precipitation increased significantly in the ARNC over the past 60 years, but the increasing trend of precipitation is also obviously intensifying. The dryness index, which comprehensively considers the effects of precipitation and temperature, has clearly decreased, and the trend in humidification has increased. Spatially, the trend of temperature increase has occurred over the entire region, while 93.4% of the region has experienced an increase in precipitation, suggesting a spatially consistent climatic warming and humidification throughout the ARNC. Long-term trends and interannual changes in temperature and precipitation dominate the changes in climatic warming and humidification. Compared to interannual variations in temperature, the trend change of temperature contributes more to the overall temperature change. However, the contribution of interannual variations in precipitation is greater than that of the precipitation trend to the overall precipitation change. The current climatic warming and humidification generally promote the growth of ecological vegetation. Since the 1980 s,82.4% of the regional vegetation has thrived. The vegetation index has a significant positive correlation with precipitation and temperature. However, it responds more significantly to interannual precipitation variation, although the vegetation response varies significantly under different types of land use. The warming and humidification of the climate in the ARNC are probably related to intensifications of the westerly wind circulation and ascending air motions.They are expected to continue in the future, although the strength of the changes will probably be insufficient to significantly change the basic climate pattern in the ARNC. The results of this study provide helpful information for decision making related to China's "Belt and Road" development strategies.

Did Ecological Engineering Projects Have a Significant Effect on Large-scale Vegetation Restoration in Beijing-Tianjin Sand Source Region, China？ A Remote Sensing Approach

Aiming for the restoration of degraded ecosystems, many ecological engineering projects have been implemented around the world. This study investigates the ecological engineering project effectiveness on vegetation restoration in the Beijing-Tianjin Sand Source Region(BTSSR) from 2000 to 2010 based on the rain use efficiency(RUE) trend in relation to the land cover. More than half of the BTSSR experienced a vegetation productivity increase from 2000 to 2010, with the increasing intensity being sensitive to the indicators chosen. A clear tendency towards smaller increasing areas was shown when using the net primary productivity(NPP, 51.30%) instead of the accumulated normalized difference vegetation index(59.30%). The short-term variation in the precipitation and intra-seasonal precipitation distribution had a great impact on the remote sensing-based vegetation productivity. However, the residual trends method(RESTREND) effectively eliminated this correlation, while incorporating the variance and skewness of the precipitation distribution increased the models′ ability to explain the vegetation productivity variation. The RUE combined with land cover dynamics was valid for the effectiveness assessment of the ecological engineering projects on vegetation restoration. Particularly, the result based on growing season accumulated normalized difference vegetation index(ΣNDVI) residuals was the most effective, showing that 47.39% of the BTSSR experienced vegetation restoration from 2000 to 2010. The effectiveness of the ecological engineering projects differed for each subarea and was proportional to the strength of ecological engineering. The water erosion region dominated by woodland showed the best restoration, followed by the wind-water erosion crisscross regions, while the wind erosion regions dominated by grassland showed the worst effect. Seriously degraded regions still cover more area in the BTSSR than restored regions. Therefore, more future effort should be put in restoring degraded land.

Evaluation on Ecological Vulnerability of the Vegetation in the Subei Lake Watershed Based on Analytic Hierarchy Process

[ Objective] The research aimed to evaluate ecological vulnerability of the vegetation in the Subei Lake watershed based on analytic hierarchy process （AHP）. [ Method] From actual situation of the vegetation ecology in the Subei Lake watershed, by the established evaluation index system of vegetation ecology, based on AHP, indicator weight at each layer was determined. Comprehensive index method was used to calculate ecological fragility degree of the vegetation in each evaluation unit to evaluate ecological vulnerability of the vegetation. [ Result] Ecological vulnera- bility of the vegetation was divided into four levels, such as extremely fragile, highly fragile, moderately fragile and lowly fragile in the Subei Lake watershed. The extremely fragile area, where buried depth of the groundwater level was generally less than 1.0 meter, distributed in beach zones near the Subei Lake, and its relationship between vegetation and groundwater was close. The lowly fragile areas scattered in the ridge zone around the Subei Lake watershed, where buried depth of the groundwater level was 10.0 -40.0 meters, and their relationship between vegetation growth and groundwater depth was not obvious. Buried depth of groundwater had the most sensitive influence on vegetation ecology, and it was the key factor between utilization of groundwater resources and eco-environment protection in the study area. E Conclusion] The researches provided scientific evidence for regional eco-environment protection, rational development and utilization of water resources, and coordinated development of economy and society.

The ecohydrology of the soil-vegetation system restoration in arid zones: a review

Arid zones, which cover approximately 40 percent of the earth’s land surface, support complicated and widely varied ecological systems. As such, arid zones are an important composition of the global terrestrial ecosystem, and water is the key and abiotic lim-ited factor in ecosystem-driven processes in these areas. Ecohydrology is a new cross discipline that provides, in an objective and comprehensive manner, novel ideas and approaches to the evaluation of the interaction and feedback mechanisms involved in the soil–vegetation systems in arid zones. In addition, ecohydrology provides a theoretical basis of ecological restoration that is cen-tered on vegetation construction. In this paper, long-term monitoring and local observations in the transitional belt between a de-sertified steppe and a steppified desert at the Shapotou Desert Research and Experiment Station, Tengger Desert, in northern China, were evaluated. The primary achievements and related research progress regarding ecohydrology in arid zones were analyzed and summarized, as a keystone, and the response of soil ecohydrological processes to the changes in the species composition, structure, and function of sandland vegetation was discussed. Meanwhile, the long-term ecological effects and mechanism of regulation of vegetation on soil habitat and on water-cycling were considered. As a vital participant in the ecohydrological processes of soil–vegetation systems, the studies on biological soil crusts was also summarized, and related theoretical models of restoration based on the water balance was reviewed.

Ecology of the rehabilitation of vegetation on tropical coastal eroded land in Guangdong， China

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Vegetation ecological benefts index (VEBI): a 3D spatial model for evaluating the ecological benefits of vegetation

Urban population explosion may increase ecological environment discomfort,thereby affecting negatively humans’mental and physical performance.Therefore,it is important to detect and monitor vegetation and predict its ecological benefits.The complex composition of urban environment ground objects,such as steel roofs,plastic courts,and building shadows,significantly interferes with vegetation detection and monitoring.The optimized hyperspectral image-based vegetation index(OHSVI)constructed in this study effectively solves this problem.However,it is difficult to accurately predict the ecological benefits of vegetation based on the two-dimensional vegetation information extracted based on remote sensing images;this is related to the three-dimensional(3D)structure of vegetation and the 3D pattern of buildings.Therefore,wefirst proposed the vegetation ecological benefits index(VEBI)based on the 3D structure of vegetation to reveal how vegetation acts on its 3D surroundings.The method was tested in a playground,an academic building,and a parking space.The results showed that the vegetation extraction accuracy of the OHSVI exceeded 93%,which is better than that of the existing indices.Ourfindings suggest that VEBI may be efficient in predicting 3D vegetation ecological benefits combined with remote sensing and lidar datasets.

Impacts of revegetation management modes on soil properties and vegetation ecological restoration in degraded sandy grassland in farming-pastoral ecotone

Focusing on the impact of various vegetation management modes on sandy grassland's soil property and vegetation ecological restoration of farming-pastoral ecotone,field surveys and lab analysis were conducted to study the correlation between the characteristics of soil properties and vegetation ecological restoration under four different vegetation management modes,i.e.,unenclosed natural restoration,enclosed natural restoration,unenclosed artificial restoration and enclosed artificial restoration,which have a restoration history of 15 years in the southern edge of the degraded sandy land area of Mu Us Desert in Leilongwan Town,Hengshan County,Shaanxi Province.After 15 years of vegetation restoration,these four vegetation management modes all proved to be useful for improving the vegetation ecological restoration and the soil quality of the degraded sandy grassland not only by enhancing the aboveground vegetation height,coverage and biomass but also increasing the content of soil clay,organic matter,CEC,total nitrogen,available nutrient while reducing soil bulk density.The vegetation ecological restoration effect and soil quality under enclosed or artificial restoration management are better than those of unenclosed or natural restoration management;and the most satisfactory vegetation ecological restoration effects and soil quality can be achieved under the integration of enclosed and artificial restoration management.Severely degraded sandy grassland,during the vegetation restoration,would form an interactional coordinating relationship with the vegetation and soil properties.Vegetation properties as height,coverage and biomass have significant positive correlations with organic matter,CEC,total nitrogen and available nitrogen,phosphorus,and potassium contained in soil.Only the adoption of the strict enclosure system,implementation of aggressive artificial vegetation restoration measures and the realization of the regurgitation-feeding policy of industry towards husbandry can guarantee the gradual restoration of degraded sandy grassland in farming-pastoral ecotone,so that it can continue to play the role of ecological protective screen.

Plant community composition and interspecific relationships among dominant species on a post-seismic landslide in Hongchun Gully, China

The 5.12 Earthquake in 2008 and 8.14 Debris Flow in 2010 resulted in large-scale landslides that disturbed vast areas of vegetation in the Hongchun Gully, Wenchuan County, China. To define the specific characteristics of vegetation restoration during natural recovery after catastrophic events,vegetation species composition and interspecific associations were investigated on this typical landslide. Field survey data selected from a total of 51 sample plots belonged to seven belt transects and were analysed by Schluter's variance ratio, pearson's chi-squared test, Spearman's correlation coefficients and ecological species groups. Plant communities on the landslide consisted of 78 species, 65 genera and52 families. Of the total of 78 species, 25 are identified as dominant species, among which Camptotheca acuminate, Toxicodendron vernicifluum, Coriaria nepalensis, Robinia pseudoacacia, Buddleja alternifolia, Anemone vitifolia and Nephrolepis auriculata play a constructive role during the natural afforestation. Moreover, according to environmental and ecological factors, these 25 dominant species could be divided into four ecological species groups.This study found that even though the landslide had frequently suffered from interference due to heavy rain, the vegetation succession processes are ongoing,and it is now at a shrub–herb community succession stage, which indicates that vegetation can naturally recover in the denuded sites. This study provides a useful insight into the ecological interactions and interdependence between plant species during the natural recovery of vegetation and provides valuable information on vegetation recovery modelling in the landslide area.

Spatio-temporal Variation of Vegetation Ecological Quality and Its Response to Climate Change in Rocky Desertification Areas in Southwest China during 2000–2020

Vegetation restoration is the primary task of ecological reconstruction and rocky desertification control in Karst areas. With vegetation net primary productivity and coverage as two key indicators, a vegetation ecological quality evaluation model was built based on meteorological and remote sensing data. Spatiotemporal variation of vegetation ecological quality index and its response to climate change in rocky desertification areas in Southwest China during 2000-2020 were also analyzed by using the difference method and linear trend method. The results showed that:(1) Vegetation ecological quality in rocky desertification areas in Southwest China showed a fluctuating upward trend during 2000-2020. In 2020, the vegetation ecological quality index reached 69.7, which was 19.9% and 9.3% higher than the averaged values for 2000 and 2000-2019, respectively, ranking the fourth highest since 2000.(2) Vegetation ecological quality of the rocky desertification areas in Yunnan, Guangxi and Guizhou provinces have been improved by 89.2%, 99.2% and 98.5%, respectively, from 2000 to 2020, with their vegetation ecological quality index values increasing by 0.5-0.75 per year in southeast Yunnan, most areas in Guizhou and northwest Guangxi.(3) Precipitation was an important meteorological factor affecting the vegetation ecological quality in rocky desertification areas. The vegetation ecological quality index in the northwest and central Yunnan rocky desertification areas has been rising slowly, but with localized declines at a yearly rate of nearly 0.25 caused by climatic warming and drying.

Remote Sensing Study of Gold Biogeochemical Effects in the Western Guangdong-Hainan Region——A Case Study of the Hetai Gold Deposit

The vegetation has been poisoned by gold in the western Guangdong-Hainan region. The gold content ofthe leaves there is as high as 10-1961 times the abundance, the chlorophyll content is 10%-30% lower thanthat of the vegetation in metamorphic terrains and 10%-20% higher than that in granite terrains, and thecarotenoid content is 10%-44% lower than the background value. The water content of leaves is 10% to 20%lower than the background value. The cells of leaves are deformed and broken. The leaf surface shows colourspots and becomes yellow or dark green. The spectral reflectance of the leaf surface is 5%-30% higher than thebackground value: the spectral shape has shifted 5-15 nm to the short wavelength. The gray scales of eanopyon images of Landsat TM and airborne imaging scanner (AIS) are 10%-100% higher than the backgroundvalues. On Landsat TM and AIS false colour images, plants poisoned by gold display a yellow color, whichdisinguishes them from background plants. According to the spectral and image features of goldbiogeochemical effects, the author has constructed a gold information system and expert prediction system,and thus two gold target areas and two gold prospect areas have been identified rapidly, economically andaccurately in the western Guangdong-Hainan region which is extensively covered by vegetation.