Spatio-temporal evolution analysis of landscape pattern and habitat quality in the Qinghai Province section of the Yellow River Basin from 2000 to 2022 based on InVEST model

Habitat quality is an important indicator for evaluating the quality of ecosystem.The Qinghai Province section of the Yellow River Basin plays an important role in the ecological protection of the upper reaches of the Yellow River Basin.To comprehensively analysis the alterations of habitat quality in the Qinghai Province section of the Yellow River Basin,this study utilized the Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs(InVEST)model to calculate the habitat quality index and analyze the spatio-temporal variation characteristics of habitat quality in the study area from 2000 to 2022,and calculated seven landscape pattern indices(number of patches,patch density,largest patch index(LPI),landscape shape index(LSI),contagion index(CONTAG),Shannon diversity index,and Shannon evenness index)to research the variation of landscape pattern in the study area.The results showed that the number of patches,patch density,LPI,LSI,Shannon diversity index,and Shannon evenness index increased from 2000 to 2022,while the CONTAG decreased,indicating that the landscape pattern in the Qinghai Province section of the Yellow River Basin changed in the direction of distribution fragmentation,shape complexity,and heterogeneity.The average value of the habitat quality index in the Qinghai Province section of the Yellow River Basin from 2000 to 2022 was 0.90.Based on the value of habitat quality index,we divided the level of habitat quality into five categories:lower(0.00-0.20),low(0.20-0.40),moderate(0.40-0.60),high(0.60-0.80),and higher(0.80-1.00).Most areas were at the higher habitat quality level.The lower habitat quality patches were mainly distributed in Longyang Gorge and Yellow River-Huangshui River Valley.From 2000 to 2022,the habitat quality in most areas was stable;the increase areas were mainly distributed in Guinan County,while the decrease areas were mainly distributed in Xining City,Maqen County,Xinghai County,Qumarleb County,and Darlag County.To show the extent of habitat quality variation,we calculated Sen index.The results showed that the higher habitat quality area had a decrease trending,while other categories had an increasing tendency,and the decreasing was faster than increasing.The research results provide scientific guidance for promoting ecological protection and high-quality development in the Qinghai Province section of the Yellow River Basin.

Spatiotemporal landscape pattern changes and their effects on land surface temperature in greenbelt with semi-arid climate:A case study of the Erbil City,Iraq

Urban expansion of cities has caused changes in land use and land cover(LULC)in addition to transformations in the spatial characteristics of landscape structure.These alterations have generated heat islands and rise of land surface temperature(LST),which consequently have caused a variety of environmental issues and threated the sustainable development of urban areas.Greenbelts are employed as an urban planning containment policy to regulate urban expansion,safeguard natural open spaces,and serve adaptation and mitigation functions.And they are regarded as a powerful measure for enhancing urban environmental sustainability.Despite the fact that,the relation between landscape structure change and variation of LST has been examined thoroughly in many studies,but there is a limitation concerning this relation in semi-arid climate and in greenbelts as well,with the lacking of comprehensive research combing both aspects.Accordingly,this study investigated the spatiotemporal changes of landscape pattern of LULC and their relationship with variation of LST within an inner greenbelt in the semi-arid Erbil City of northern Iraq.The study utilized remote sensing data to retrieve LST,classified LULC,and calculated landscape metrics for analyzing spatial changes during the study period.The results indicated that both composition and configuration of LULC had an impact on the variation of LST in the study area.The Pearson's correlation showed the significant effect of Vegetation 1 type(VH),cultivated land(CU),and bare soil(BS)on LST,as increase of LST was related to the decrease of VH and the increases of CU and BS,while,neither Vegetation 2 type(VL)nor built-up(BU)had any effects.Additionally,the spatial distribution of LULC also exhibited significant effects on LST,as LST was strongly correlated with landscape indices for VH,CU,and BS.However,for BU,only aggregation index metric affected LST,while none of VL metrics had a relation.The study provides insights for landscape planners and policymakers to not only develop more green spaces in greenbelt but also optimize the spatial landscape patterns to reduce the influence of LST on the urban environment,and further promote sustainable development and enhance well-being in the cities with semi-arid climate.

Analysis and Simulation for Landscape Pattern Changes of Land Use in Wuzhong District, Suzhou City

Based on analyzing the changes of land use in Wuzhong District, Suzhou City from 2005 to 2008, temporal and spatial changes of land use from 2008 to 2020 were analyzed by using the model CLUE-S and, from the perspective of landscape ecology, future landscape pattern changes of land use in Wuzhong District were also quantitatively discussed by utilizing landscape indices. The results indicated that there was a large variation range of land use in Wuzhong District from 2005 to 2008 and massive farmland and woodland were transformed into construction land and gardens. Guided by the policy of saving intensive land and protecting farmland, future variation range of land use will get smaller obviously. The fragmentation degree for farmland, woodland and water area will get decreased but will get increased relatively for construction land. In general, all landscapes tend to a balanced development.

Analysis of Forest Landscape Pattern in Nanling National Nature Reserve,Guangdong

[Objective] The study was to analyze the forest landscape in Nanling Na- tional Nature Reserve to provide information for the protection of local forest ecosys- tems. [Method] With the documents of 1：10 000 topographic maps, updated Forest Resource Inventory Data, based on the GIS platform and Fragstats software, the paper analyzed the patterns and heterogeneity of forest landscapes by adopting the landscape ecological theory and the method of landscape index. [Result] The forest landscape types, in terms of area occupation from large to small, are in the order of evergreen broad-leaved forest, coniferous mixed forest, evergreen and deciduous broad-leaved mixed forest, shrubs, mixed needle leaf forest, suitable land for forest deciduous broad-leaved forest and non-forest. [Conclusion] Overall, the Reserve had maintained sufficient forest landscape diversity with a low level fragmentation. The distribution of various types of forest landscape was extremely uneven, dominated by several types such as evergreen broad-leaved forest, coniferous forest, etc.

Landscape pattern and diversity of natural secondary forests in the eastern mountainous region, northeast China:A case study of Mao'ershan region in Heilongjiang Province

Mao抏rshan region is a representative natural secondary forested region in the eastern mountainous region, north-east of China. Under the support of ARC/INFO, the landscape pattern and landscape diversity of Maoerhshan region were studied by combining the forest type map (1:10000), which was drawn from the aerial photographs (1999), field investigation and land utilization map (1:10000). The selected indices included patch number, patch size, patch density index, richness index, dominance index, evenness index and diversity index. The results showed that the landscape dominant forest type in Mao抏rshan region was softwood broad-leaved forest. In all landscape types, the average patch area of natural secondary for-ests was bigger than that of artificial forest. The patch density index of each landscape formed in artificial forest was higher than that of natural secondary forest. The landscape diversity index and landscape evenness index of natural forest were highest, the landscape heterogeneity was also, but the landscape dominance was lower. In natural forest, the control effects of landscape elements on landscape-structure, function and its change were weakened. The artificial forest was on the contrary.

Changes of Wetland Landscape Pattern in New Coastal District of Tianjin City

With the wetland landscape in New Coastal District of Tianjin City as the chief study objective and based on the remote sensing and non-remote sensing data of ETM/TM with 1999-2007 as the time scale and the new administrative region of New Coastal District as the space (scale) scope, this paper conducted the study on the landscape pattern change. The results showed that the natural wetland and agricultural land tended to decrease, while the saltern, maricultural areas and construction land increased apparently. The overall landscape shape tended to develop in simplification and regulation and with the development of population and social economy, human’s intervention to the landscape was getting improved.

Application of UAV Image in Quantitative Analysis of Landscape Pattern of Railway

Taking Beijing–Shanghai High-speed Railway(the section of Zhenjiangnan Station) for example,this paper applied UAV remote sensing data and GIS spatial analysis to analyze current land use types in this section,on this basis used landscape pattern indices that showed high correlation with land use changes for the quantitative analysis and evaluation of ecosystem structure in the study area and also landscape pattern after the construction of high-speed railway.The results showed that UAV images performed well in the evaluation of railway landscape ecological environment,landscape structure and features represented by the selected landscape pattern indices in this paper were applicable,and capable of ensuring scientific evaluation of ecological environmental impact;the overall landscape pattern of the Zhenjiangnan Station section(Beijing–Shanghai High-speed Railway) after completion was moderate,and local ecosystem was damaged,thus scientific and reasonable ecological planning was required to design and change landscape structure.

Study on the Vegetation Landscape Pattern of Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan Province

This study aimed to provide theoretical bases for optimized land use in minority settlements at high altitude. On the basis of forest form map and land use type map (1∶250 000) of Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan Province in 2007, this study carried out further analysis and assessment on the landscape pattern and fragmentation degree of Ganzi from the perspective of overall landscape characteristics, area and perimeter of patches, quantity and fractal dimension of patches and so on with the support of geo-info systematical software ArcCIS and landscape structure analysis software Fragstats. The results showed that among all landscape elements alpine meadow and evergreen broad-leaved shrubs take up a larger part as temperate and cool temperate grassland and marsh are scattered with small areas; deciduous and broad-leaved as well as their mixed forest have higher landscape fragmentation degree, on the whole, the fragmentation degree of forest type is higher than that of meadow and shrub; fractal dimensions of landscape components are all small and tend to 1, which indicates that the folded degree of all landscape boundaries are small.

Development of a New Index for Integrating Landscape Patterns with Ecological Processes at Watershed Scale

Understanding the relationship between landscape pattems and ecological processes has been a central yet challenging research theme in landscape ecology. Over the past decades, many landscape metrics have been proposed but few directly incorporated ecological processes. In this paper, we developed a landscape index, namely, location-weighted landscape index （LWLI） to highlight the role of landscape type in ecological processes, such as nutrient losses and soil erosion. Within the framework of the Lorenz curve theory, we develop this index by integrating land- scape pattern and point-based measurements at a watershed scale. The index can be used to characterize the contribution of landscape pattern to ecological processes （e.g. nutrient losses） with respect to a specific monitoring point in a watershed. Through a case study on nutrient losses in an agricultural area in northeastern China, we found that nutrient losses tended to be higher for a watershed with a higher LWLI value, and vice versa. It implied that LWLI can be used to evaluate the potential risk of nutrient losses or soil erosion by comparing their values across watersheds. In addition, this index can be extended to characterize ecological processes, such as the effect of landscape pattern on wildlife inhabitation and urban heat island effect. Finally, we discuss several problems that should be paid attention to when applying this index to a heterogeneous landscape site.

Analysis of Changing Landscape Pattern in Baiyangdian before and after Ecological Water Supplement Project Based on RS and GIS

By using TM remote sensing images of Baiyangdian Wetland in 1989,1999,2003 and 2004,taking the water area between Anxin County and Cangzhou where most of Baiyangdian Wetland water body lies for landscape classification,changes in landscape pattern of Baiyangdian before and after the water supplement were analyzed with landscape indexes calculated by Fragstats3.3. The results showed that after the water supplement,from the perspective of landscape cell index,fractal dimension of major ecosystems in Baiyangdian decreased to some extent;from the perspective of landscape diversity index,diversity index of the study region also decreased,which demonstrated that ecosystem diversity in this region reduced,land cover grew to simplification;and the decreasing evenness degree of the study region also showed the uneven development of its ecosystems. That is to say,water supplement has brought favorable ecological changes to the eco-environment of Baiyangdian,which has further optimized the health condition of ecosystems in this region.

RS and GIS-based Analysis on Dynamic Changes of Landscape Pattern on Urban-rural Fringe——A Case Study of Licheng District, Jinan City of China

By using GIS, RS and landscape ecology, LandsatTM (1993 and 2009) and ETM (2001) remote sensing images of Licheng District of Ji’nan City, Shandong Province were interpreted, and dynamic changes of landscape pattern in the district were analyzed at the levels of class and landscape. The results showed that during the 16 years the landscape pattern in the district had changed significantly. (a) From the perspective of patch category, areas of arable land, woodland and grassland decreased unceasingly, and arable land accounted for the largest reduction from 488.15 km 2 in 1993 down to 324.37 km 2 in 2009, witnessing a reduction rate of 33.56%. But the patch quantity and fragmentation increased, patch connectivity reduced. Spatial pattern of construction land expanded and its area witnessed a significant increase of 147.05%. Patch cohesion index increased and connectivity grew better. (b) From the perspective of overall landscape, patch quantity, contagion and perimeter-area fractal dimension decreased, patch shape became simple, the Shannon’s diversity index, Shannon’s evenness index and splitting index increased, landscape heterogeneity rose. With the rapid social and economic development, landscape pattern will be more and more influenced by human behaviors

The role of landscape pattern analysis in understanding concepts of land cover change

Landscape ecology and landscape pattern analysis are important components of national-scale programs to identify trends in land cover change because: 1) Statistics on changes in land cover proportions are not spatial. A change matrix derived from GIS provides useful information, but it does not show the spatial form of change in the landscape. Landscape pattern metrics reveal spatial pattern. 2) A growing body of literature has shown that a change in landscape pattern might indicate important changes in ecological functions: forest connectivity and species movements, number and size of farm patches, effects on water quality. Spatial pattern is important in structuring ecological communities and in maintaining existence of competitors. Spatial pattern may be determined by disturbance and may in turn, determine how disturbances propagate through the system. 3) Sometimes landscape pattern may not significantly change, even though land cover proportions do change. Or, vice-versa, sometimes landscape pattern can significantly change, even though land cover proportions don't significantly change. 4) Landscape pattern is an inherent and important part of describing landscapes: based on the literature, one of the most important descriptive characteristics of a landscape is its texture. The objectives of this paper are to: 1) Explain the importance of the role of landscape ecology and landscape pattern analysis in land cover change studies; 2) Review the literature that specifically incorporates landscape ecology into land cover change studies; and 3) List the theoretical and technical issues involved and suggest solutions for them.

Dynamics of Wetland Landscape Pattern in Kaifeng City from 1987 to 2002

It is very significant for urban development and urban wetland protection and utilization to probe into the process and reasons of urban wetland landscape dynamics. Taking the information of remote sensing and detailed land survey data as the basic information sources, with the help of RS and GIS, according to the principles and methods of landscape ecology, this paper analyzed wetland landscape pattern dynamics and its reasons in Kaifeng City, Henan Province of China, from 1987 to 2002. The results show that the total wetland area in Kaifeng City firstly reduced by 20.1% from 1987 to 1990 and then increased from 1990 to 2002, with an average annual growth rate of 3.3%. At the same time, landscape fragment degree and landscape dominance degree increased, respectively from 0.64 to 0.72 and from 0.3754 to 0.5563, but mean patch area, maximum patch area, patch fractal dimension reduced. As far as single landscape element concerned, fi＇om 1987 to 2002, patch area, patch number, patch density, patch shape and patch location changed in varying degrees in all wetland types in Kaifeng City, among which rice field changed most and others relatively less. In the recent 20 years, rice fields, lake wetlands, puddles and ponds had a higher stability, but river and bottomland wetlands were mostly transformed to land use types. The change of wetland landscape pattern was the result of the combined action of the Huanghe （Yellow） River, urban expansion, wide cultivation of rice, and rapid development of fishery. Among them human activities were the main driving factors for wetland landscape changes.

Regional agricultural landscape pattern changes along the Yellow River in Henan Province from 1987 to 2002

Agricultural landscape along the riparian zones is designated as important landscape components for partly controlling water quality, biodiversity, as well as for their aesthetic role in landscapes. Therefore, the change of agricultural landscape along the riparian zones is at the top of the agenda for many policy makers and landscape planners. As a basis for conservation management, sufficient information about landscape structure should be provided. In the present study, we reconstructed the former landscape structure and elucidated the changes in landscape patterns during a period of about 15 years. Two sets of maps were used： a landsat-5 TM image （1987） and landsat-7 ETM image （2002）. The frequency index, landscape diversity index and landscape fragmentation index were calculated for analyses. The results showed that： （1） the areas of the irrigated land, river, forest and beach landscape classes presented a decreasing trend while the areas of landscape classes of pool, paddy fields, dry land and construction land increased. （2） Disturbed by human activity, landscape diversity index increased but landscape fragmentation index decreased. In short, Human activities have had important influences on agricultural landscape of the riparian zones along the Yellow River in Henan Province.

Landscape pattern and its effect on ecosystem functions in Seoul Metropolitan area:Urban ecology on distribution of the naturalized plant species

During land transformation process in the human history, naturalized plants were introduced to several land use patterns by the different ways of plant itself. Including some naturalized plants that had been contribute to land restoration, many naturalized plants have been invaded to original habitat or landscape for native plants. Once the plants were colonized, they extend their area and population size. Urban developed areas often give an important role of source habitat for naturalized plants and expanding their population size. In recent, this situation is appearing as one of environmental problems about the urban landscape management controlling the naturalized plants that invaded in the developed area and conserving the native vegetation. This paper is focusing on relationships between distribution of habitat of naturalized plants and landscape patch in urban area in Seoul. Gangdong-Gu, one of the administrative areas in Seoul was selected for this study. We examined the recent land use change using LANDSAT TM data and spreading of the representative naturalized plants (Robinia pseudoacacia and Eupatorium rugosum) by Seoul Biotope Mapping Project and field survey in 1999. As a result, these two species were often occurred in the same habitat and distributed in forest edge disturbed by man. Their distribution patterns were related to landscape indices (patch size and shape) in the forest edge.

Analysis on Landscape Pattern of Urban Green Space in Tianjin City

Based on IKONOS satellite image in August of 2008,and by using GIS technique and spatial pattern analysis software FRAGSTATS,the paper analyzed landscape pattern of urban green space in Tianjin City from the aspects of patch composition and level of category and landscape.The result showed that there were manymin-sized patches in Tianjin City while large patches occupied a large proportion of the total area of green space.Green spaces were unbalanced in distribution and unreasonable in structure.It suggested adjusting the structure of urban green space,reducing the degree of landscape fragmentation,strengthening the construction of large and mid-sized green patches,so as to improve ecological function of green space.

Landscape pattern dynamics of water body in Kaifeng city in the 20th century

Landscape spatial pattern mainly refers to the distribution of patches, which are different in size and shape in space owing to the interaction of various ecological activities. In landscape ecology study, landscape pattern has been one of the key study areas. Water body landscape plays an important role in the development history of a city, but at present city water body landscape in many cities has been destroyed, hence protecting water body in the city is becoming more and more important. In order to protect city water body landscape reasonably, the precondition is to probe the dynamics of water body landscape. Based on historical data and remote sensing data, six indexes including patch number, patch area, landscape dominance index, fractal dimension, patch density and connectivity index etc. were used to analyze landscape pattern dynamics of water body in Kaifeng city since the end of the Qing Dynasty (in the 20th century). The results showed: (1) Since the end of the Qing Dynasty, landscape area of water body in Kaifeng city increased first and then decreased from 1898 to 2002AD; the landscape dominant degree had the same changing tendency with the area. (2) Patch number of water body landscape in Kaifeng city had an increase from 1898 to 2002, but maximum area of patch, minimum area of patch and average area of patch decreased, which resulted in an increase in landscape fragment degree. (3) Connectivity index decreased and fractal dimension increased from 1898 to 2002. The reasons for these changes were the repeated overflows and flooding of the Yellow River and the influence of human activities.

Land Use of the Three Gorges Reservoir Area and the Effect on Its Landscape Pattern in the Recent 50 Years

The paper makes detailed analysis on the changing processes of the main types of land use in Three Gorges Reservoir Area through the techniques of RS （Remote Sense） and GIS （Geography Information System）. Based on the theory of landscape ecology, many types of landscape pattern indexes are calculated and made correlation analysis. The results indicate that： in 1995 the ecological environment of Three Gorges Reservoir Area was the most vulnerable in the recent 50 years, but resumed in 2002; the landscape pattern diversity index, fractal dimension index and fragmentation index has close correlation with the area of land use/cover change （LUCC）. The research also releases that the increase of the cultivated land, grassland and construction land deteriorates the landscape ecological pattern, while the increase of forest land area will help restore the landscape ecological pattern to its original state. The rapid change of grassland is an important index of the change of landscape pattern, because it has the most effect on change of landscape pattern index.

Trend surface analysis of forest landscape pattern in Guandishan forest region of Shanxi,China

Landscape pattern is a widely used concept for the demonstration of landscape characteristic features. The integral spatial distribution trend of landscape elements is interested point in the landscape ecological research, especially in those of complex secondary forest regions with confusing mosaics of land cover. Trend surface analysis which used in community and population ecological researches was introduced to reveal the landscape pattern. A reasonable and reliable approach for application of trend surface analysis was provided in detail. As key steps of the approach, uniform grid point sampling method was developed. The efforts were also concentrated at an example of Guandishan forested landscape. Some basic rules of spatial distribution of landscape elements were exclaimed. These will be benefit to the further study in the area to enhance the forest sustainable management and landscape planning.

Responses of Spatial-temporal Variation of Karst Ecosystem Service Values to Landscape Pattern in Northwest of Guangxi,China

The responses of spatiotemporal variation of ecosystem service values (ESVs) to landscape pattern from 1985 to 2005 in a typical Karst area of the northwest Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region,China,were examined us-ing remote sensing and geographic information system techniques in this paper.The total ecosystem service values de-clined significantly from 1985 to 1990,and then increased slowly from 1990 to 2005,almost equaled to the 1985 level.The ecosystem service values tended to decline from the west to the east and from mountainous regions to peak-cluster depression areas in 1985,1990,2000 and 2005 respectively.During the period from 1985 to 2005,the ecosystem ser-vice values have increased in the middle and eastern parts of the study area.Landscape pattern indices,such as total area,largest patch index,contagion,aggregative index,effective mesh and proportion of like adjacencies,are significantly correlated with ecosystem service values.This suggests that ecosystem service values tend to increase with the growth of patch area and patch connectivity.However,there are negative correlations between ecosystem service values and landscape pattern indices,such as division index and patch richness.It indicates that ecosystem service values decrease with patch fragmentation and patch size shrinkage.The ecosystem conditions in the typical Karst area have been improved because of the control measures of rocky desertification.It is important to protect key landscape types,such as woodland,shrub and grassland,and to increase patch size and connectivity to avoid further fragmentation.Furthermore,it is necessary to reduce disturbances to ensure the growth of ecosystem service values and to facilitate the sustainable development in this region.