Modeling broad-scale patterns of avian species richness across the Midwestern United States with measures of satellite image texture

Avian biodiversity is threatened, and in order to prioritize limited conservation resources and conduct effective conservation planning a better understanding of avian species richness patterns is needed. The use of image texture measures, as a proxy for the spatial structure of land cover and vegetation, has proven useful in explaining patterns of avian abundance and species richness. However, prior studies that modeled habitat with texture measures were conducted over small geographical extents and typically focused on a single habitat type. Our goal was to evaluate the performance of texture measures over broad spatial extents and across multiple habitat types with varying levels of vertical habitat structure. We calculated a suite of texture measures from 114 Landsat images over a study area of 1,498,000 km² in the Midwestern United States, which included habitats ranging from grassland to forest. Avian species richness was modeled for several functional guilds as a function of image texture. We subsequently compared the explanatory power of texture-only models with models fitted using landscape composition metrics derived from the National Land Cover Dataset, as well as models fitted using both texture and composition metrics. Measures of image texture were effective in modeling spatial patterns of avian species richness in multiple habitat types, explaining up to 51% of the variability in species richness of permanent resident birds. In comparison, landscape composition metrics explained up to 56% of the variability in permanent resident species richness. In the most heavily forested ecoregion, texture-measures outperformed landscape metrics, and the two types of measurements were complementary in multivariate models. However, in two out of three ecoregions examined, landscape composition metrics consistently performed slightly better than texture measures, and the variance explained by the two types of measures overlapped considerably. These results show that image texture measures derived from satellite imagery can be an important tool for modeling patterns of avian species richness at broad spatial extents, and thus assist in conservation planning. However, texture measures were slightly inferior to landscape composition metrics in about three-fourths of our models. Therefore texture measures are best considered in conjunction with landscape metrics (if available) and are best used when they show explanatory ability that is complementarity to landscape metrics.     

Connectivity of core habitat in the Northeastern United States: Parks and protected areas in a landscape context

The exurbanization process, particularly rural residential development, is reducing the amount of roadless areas and remote habitat across the nation, with implications for biodiversity and ecosystem integrity of parks and protected areas. The need for connecting protected areas via existing habitat centers, or relatively undisturbed core areas, is greater than ever as exurbanization expands. Our objective was to make use of nationally available data sets on roads as well as information derived from satellite imagery, including impervious cover of the built environment and forest canopy density, to identify core habitat of the northeastern and mid-Atlantic USA. The identified core habitat areas, which covered 73,730 km² across 1177 discrete units, were stratified in terms of land ownership and management, and then analyzed in a landscape context using connectivity metrics derived from graph theory. The connectivity analysis made use of a suitability surface, derived from the land cover information, which approximated the costs incurred by hypothetical animals traversing the landscape. We show that protected areas are frequently identified as core habitat but are typically isolated, albeit sometimes buffered by adjacent multi-use lands (such as state or national forests). Over one third of the core habitat we identified has no protection, and another 42% is subject to motorized recreation or timber extraction. We provide maps showing the relative importance of core habitat areas for potentially connecting existing protected areas, and also provide an example of the vulnerability of connectivity to projected future residential development around one greater park ecosystem.     

Conservation planning to zone protected areas under optimal landscape management for bird conservation

This study proposes a two-stage conservation planning approach. Firstly, the Land-Use Pattern Optimization-library is used to maximize the suitability of habitats for target species by optimizing configuration based on the current landscape. Secondly, the systematic conservation planning tool, Marxan is used to identify protected areas based on the estimated species distributions from the optimal landscape configuration. We compared our conservation plan for three target bird species from a highland farm with the conservation plan produced using Marxan alone. Our comparison showed the effectiveness of our approach by selecting a reserve network with higher habitat suitability, better connection, and smaller size after relatively minor landscape modification. The proposed approach advances previous reserve site selection algorithms by considering optimal landscape configuration and potential species distributions for a reserve network design. Our approach yields priority maps to guide the design of a reserve network as well as identify landscape management for conservation.     

Spatial pattern analysis for monitoring protected areas

The management of diverse biota within protected areas is affected by both land cover change within a protected area and habitat loss and fragmentation in the surrounding landscape. Satellite images provide a synoptic view of land cover patterns, but the use of such imagery requires careful consideration of sensor type, resolution, extent, and the metrics used to quantify ecologically significant change. We examined these factors for landscape monitoring applications in four small National Parks near Washington, DC: Antietam National Battlefield, Catoctin Mountain Park, Prince William Forest Park and Rock Creek Park. Using 4 m Ikonos, 10 m SPOT, 15 m pan-sharpened Landsat ETM+ and 30 m Landsat ETM+ imagery, the parks and surrounding areas were mapped to National Land Cover system classes. For each park, we examined four methods for defining map extent, including park administrative boundaries, two variable buffer widths, and watershed boundaries, and then analyzed patterns of forest habitat for the maps using a graph theoretic approach (critical dispersal threshold distance) and common landscape metrics (number of patches, percent forest, forest edge density, and forest area-weighted mean patch size). As expected, landscape metrics for maps derived at differing resolutions varied significantly, but map extent often yielded even larger differences. We found that for most applications, coarser scale data (e.g., 30 m Landsat) are adequate for characterizing landscape pattern, although ultimately data from multiple sensors may be appropriate or necessary based on different objectives of landscape monitoring (e.g., mapping single trees vs. forest stands) and the scale at which a resource of interest interacts with the larger landscape (e.g., birds vs. herptiles). Our results provide a strong caution regarding the practical issues associated with combining data sources from multiple satellite sensors for monitoring applications.     

Assessment of land surface temperature in relation to landscape metrics and fractional vegetation cover in an urban/peri-urban region using Landsat data

Land surface temperature (LST) is essentially considered to be one of the most important indicators used for assessment of the urban thermal environment. It is quite evident that land-use/land-cover (LULC) and landscape patterns have ecological implications at varying spatial scales, which in turn influence the distribution of habitat and material/energy fluxes in the landscape. This article attempts to quantitatively analyse the complex interrelationships between urban LST and LULC landscape patterns with the purpose of elucidating their relation to landscape processes. The study employed an integrated approach involving remote-sensing, geographic information system (GIS), and landscape ecology techniques on bi-temporal Landsat Thematic Mapper images of Southwestern Sydney metropolitan region and the surrounding fringe, taken at approximately the same time of the year in July 1993 and July 2006. First, the LULC categories and LST were extracted from the bi-temporal images. The LST distribution and changes and LST of the LULC categories were then quantitatively analysed using landscape metrics and LST zones. The results show that large differences in temperature existed in even a single LULC category, except for variations between different LULC categories. In each LST zone, the regressive function of LST with fractional vegetation cover (FVC) indicated a significant relationship between LST and FVC. Landscape metrics of LULC categories in each zone in relation to the other zones showed changing patterns between 1993 and 2006. This study also illustrates that a method integrating retrieval of LST and FVC from remote-sensing images combined with landscape metrics provides a novel and feasible way to describe the spatial distribution and temporal variation in urban thermal patterns and associated LULC conditions in a quantitative manner.     

Optimal restoration of altered habitats

We describe a new conservation decision support tool: ‘Optimal Restoration of Altered Habitats’ (OPRAH). OPRAH combines species landscape configuration preferences and habitat quality information to optimally select habitat restoration priorities for single or multiple species. OPRAH uses a simulated annealing algorithm and information about extant native vegetation, land use and rehabilitation costs, to find solutions to non-linear landscape-scale problems. The landscape is divided into planning units, some of which represent native vegetation, while others can be restored for a given budget. A habitat restoration problem for declining woodland bird species is demonstrated as a case study.     

Insights for managers from modeling species interactions across multiple scales in an idealized landscape

In recent years there has been a shift in biodiversity efforts from protected areas to one of interlinked habitat patches across multiple land tenure types. Much work remains on how managers can intervene in such systems to achieve basic goals. We use an agent-based model of a metapopulation with predator–prey dynamics and density-dependent migration to examine theoretically the capacity of a manager to modify the ecosystem to achieve conservation goals. We explore management strategies aimed at maintaining one of two goals – local or global coexistence of species. To achieve their goal, the manager varies the connectivity between patches based on one of three strategies – the monitoring of predator, prey, or the vegetation carrying capacity of the patches. We find that strategies that lead to highest coexistence monitor mid-tier populations globally. Our goal is to use our model results to advance decision-making in conservation beyond protected areas, typical in today's conservation.     

TITIM GIS-tool: A GIS-based decision support system for measuring the territorial impact of transport infrastructures

To achieve sustainability in the area of transport we need to view the decision-making process as a whole and consider all the most important socio-economic and environmental aspects involved. Improvements in transport infrastructures have a positive impact on regional development and significant repercussions on the economy, as well as affecting a large number of ecological processes.This article presents a DSS to assess the territorial effects of new linear transport infrastructures based on the use of GIS. The TITIM – Transport Infrastructure Territorial Impact Measurement – GIS tool allows these effects to be calculated by evaluating the improvement in accessibility, loss of landscape connectivity, and the impact on other local territorial variables such as landscape quality, biodiversity and land-use quality. The TITIM GIS tool assesses these variables automatically, simply by entering the required inputs, and thus avoiding the manual reiteration and execution of these multiple processes. TITIM allows researchers to use their own GIS databases as inputs, in contrast with other tools that use official or predefined maps.The TITIM GIS-tool is tested by application to six HSR projects in the Spanish Strategic Transport and Infrastructure Plan 2005–2020 (PEIT). The tool creates all 65 possible combinations of these projects, which will be the real test scenarios. For each one, the tool calculates the accessibility improvement, the landscape connectivity loss, and the impact on the landscape, biodiversity and land-use quality. The results reveal which of the HSR projects causes the greatest benefit to the transport system, any potential synergies that exist, and help define a priority for implementing the infrastructures in the plan.     

Virtual garden landscape planning based on FPGA and GIS platform

The analysis of landscape visibility and scenic view is the essential area for studying the direct impact of landscape planning and management in a regional and urban area. The most particular analysis of landscape visualization is based on a GIS tool for conservation, management, and planning of urban landscapes for historic, major scenic spots, and value visualization. Visible mapping can be used to predict visual impact, visual acuity and natural landscape, cultural heritage of transformation and it is based on the protection of the landscape from selected points of view to significant landmarks need the intervention. Among them, the research is conducted in several cities around the world, and there is an Italian pilot project that has decided to integrate GIS-based visualization analysis into the planning of the cultural heritage. FPGA and GIS-based analysis of landscape have been implemented in various fields within the landscape planning frame work activities proposed by the development of science in Piedmont. Specific research is being conducted in the city of Turin. With an international perspective, this model focuses on describing these applications and introduces some of the difficult issues that are reduced in the field of planning and the possible uses of this technology.The design and implementation is executed in real time on Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) using Xilinx System Generator (XSG).     

城市景观生态网络连接的典型范式

城市景观生态网络连接研究是景观规划设计的重要研究领域,是理性规划的重要尝试,也是城市景观科学规划的重要发展趋势,本文在探讨城市景观生态系统特征、城市景观生态网络结构的基础上,初步分析了城市景观生态网络的典型图示,并进一步探讨了景观生态网络连接度理论评价城市景观生态系统并指导规划的发展趋势。     

Planning of landscape gardens based on ecological priority in coastal areas

Landscape garden planning, as an important part of coastal regional construction, has attracted widespread attention. In coastal landscape planning, there are many problems due to the different level of regional economic development, the unbalanced capacity of landscape planning and the unscientific guiding ideology. Therefore, a community planning of Sabina vulgaris based on ecological priority in coastal area is proposed. According to the environmental characteristics and current situation of coastal area, the ecological regionalization and index system are completed by using GIS technology, and the ecological characteristics of Sabina vulgaris community are analyzed. According to the landscape index method and the ecological risk of coastal area, the landscape garden and the effective planning of Sabina vulgaris community are determined. The results show that the area change of Sabina vulgaris community and the ecological process of community center and edge landscape prove that Sabina vulgaris community has good ecological benefits for the inner environment of landscape gardens based on coastal ecological priority.     

二值形态闭运算在优质耕地集中连片划定中的应用

目的 在当前国土资源部、农业部开展新时期永久基本农田划定工作的背景下,探索“优质耕地的集中连片划定”方法,探讨“耕地连片性”的意义,实现基于耕地质量等级的连片性划定,为永久基本农田划定和高标准农田建设提供支持。方法 从景观生态学角度,对“耕地连片性”概念进行讨论,分析耕地景观地块之间的连片阈值范围,提出以“形态学闭合运算”计算优质耕地的空间相连性,并应用此方法对金坛市金城镇耕地进行了连片性分析。结果 该方法高效地对优质耕地的连片程度进行了识别,识别结果符合当地实际情况,与其他方法相比,该方法可自定义土地质量等别及连片阈值,有效地增强了连片地块的集中性与整体性,在实现地块连片的同时很好地保留了地块边缘形状特征。结论 该方法有助于实现对于优质耕地的集中管理,并为基本农田空间配置研究提供了一种新的方法思路。     

滇金丝猴适宜栖息地的遥感分析

通过对滇金丝猴已有科考数据和相关研究成果的整理评估，综合得出了该物种适宜栖息地的生态学知识；以遥感和地理信息系统技术为主要分析手段，采集处理相关信息，建立空间模型，快速提取了适宜滇金丝猴生存的植物群／土地覆盖类型和其适宜栖息地分布数据，并与由专家手工勾绘的现有种群家域范围数据进行了比较，显示二者具有很高的符合程度。分析结果表明，目前滇金丝猴适宜栖息地的总面积为7788．069km^2，基本上被分割为9个大的片区，现有种群分布在其中的5个区域．其总面积为6448．842km^2。     

ALOS影像数据土地覆盖分类及景观特征研究

通过马氏距离法、最大似然法、支持向量机三种途径对土地覆盖进行分类,以混淆矩阵对分类结果做精度评价,结果显示,最大似然法和支持向量机分类有较好的效果。以最大似然法为例,通过引入归一化植被指数（NDVI）、基于灰度共生矩阵的纹理特征等进行不同特征组合的分类,探讨其对分类的影响。研究表明,NDVI、对比度、均值参与分类后,对分类精度都有不同程度的提高,而三者与原始波段的结合分类精度最高。基于分类结果做景观格局定量分析。结果表明,研究区景观类型较为丰富,以耕地为主导,再加上城镇和农村聚落用地,约占到整个研究区的82%,表明景观所受的人类活动干扰和压力很大、生态风险高。因此,必须强化黑河中游绿洲荒漠区的土地利用规划和管理,适当约束耕地和聚落用地的扩张,提高土地利用效率;要加强生态保护和建设,提高景观的抗干扰能力。     

Modelling of urban growth using spatial analysis techniques: a case study of Ajmer city (India)

The concentration of people in densely populated urban areas, especially in developing countries like India and China, calls for the use of sophisticated monitoring systems, like remote sensing and Geographical Information Systems (GIS). Time series of land use/cover changes can easily be generated using sequential satellite images, which are required for the prediction of urban growth, verification of growth model outputs, estimation of impervious area, parameterization of various hydrological models, water resources planning and management and environmental studies. In the present work, urban growth of Ajmer city (India) in the last 29 years has been studied at mid‐scale level (5–25 m). Remote sensing and GIS have been used to extract the information related to urban growth, impervious area and its spatial and temporal variation. Statistical classification approaches have been used to derive the land use information from satellite images of eight years (1977–2005). The Shannon's entropy and landscape metrics (patchiness and map density) are computed in order to quantify the urban form (impervious area) in terms of spatial phenomena. Further, multivariate statistical techniques have been used to establish the relationship between the urban growth and its causative factors. Results reveal that land development (200%) in Ajmer is more than three times the population growth (59%). Shannon's entropy and landscape metrics has revealed the spatial distribution of the sprawl.     

基于反馈的交互式动态GIS景观评价模型

提出一种基于反馈的交互式动态GIS景观评价模型,并指出该模型与4D-GIS模型相比较的优点.该评价模型充分考虑景观的动态性,在规划中同时加入了景观规划设计师的交互行为和规划系统本身的交互功能.利用系统本身的交互能力提供的反馈功能,规划人员可以对景观评价系统进行实时控制和修正,以达到更好的景观规划效果.最后通过一个实例简要说明了应用基于该模型的景观评价系统进行规划设计的通用流程.     

3D Garden landscape planning visualization system based on FPGA processor and virtual reality

Landscape planning is based on science and the arts. Landscape planning and design appropriate coordination to do the relationship between spatial planning and the earth, and between man and nature. Landscape planning has a fundamental goal of sustainable development, in landscape planning, more technologically advanced planning and design theory to solve the modern field's practical problems. It provides a powerful new way to functional space planning and landscape analysis. Geographic Information Systems (GIS), the importance of planning can improve outcomes. Enable planners to understand the natural landscape and accurately understand and landscape planning and landscape design some new ideas. This is the best practical implications of the simulation and verifies the effectiveness of landscape design and planning. The problem for traditional distribution landscape simulation technology, designed a new distribution pattern of rationality simulation technology based on 3D images and virtual reality technology. This analysis method is based on the first time the three-dimensional image of the garden's rational distribution. 3D image analysis of the distribution landscape's effectiveness results from a three-dimensional image reconstruction completed and based on virtual reality technology. Finally, it will discuss the garden, rational drug delivery technologies, case studies, the advantages, and performance test results.     

Monitoring by Remote Sensing of Habitat Quality Changes in Xianyang City

With the accelerating process of society，economy and urbanization，land use and landscape changes have gradually become important to make effects on regional habitat quality.It is necessary to further investigate those two effects，the result of which can provide a scientific basis for regional habitat conservation and reasonable utilization of land，then will be of great importance in habitat protection and development of the region.In this paper，the study area was located in Xianyang city，Shaanxi Province，which had the frequent human activities and obvious land use changes.Based on the classification of land use data which interpreted by remote sensing，supported by ArcGIS software，the land use transfer matrix of Xianyang from 2000 to 2010 was analyzed.Landscape metrics were calculated by the Fragstats software，which represented for the landscape pattern changes and spatial characteristics.The InVEST model was selected to evaluate habitat quality in study area.The habitat quality changes was monitored.The results indicate that the integrated land use dynamics of Xianyang city is 2.34%，and the changes of land use rate is slow.The main transition from cultivated land and grassland to forest and construction land，which cause the area of first two land use types reduced，and the latter two types increased.The degree of fragmentation and the complexity of structure in landscape are higher than before.Habitat quality improved slightly，and its overall spatial pattern is that central and north areas are relatively higher than the south.Area percentage of excellent，good and poor grades increase，while the habitat quality of medium grade significantly decline.Among 14 districts and counties of habitat quality in Xianyang city，Xunyi County is the best，and the improved magnitude of Liquan county is the most significant.The main driving force of habitat quality change is the transform of land use pattern.Therefore，the relevant departments of Xianyang city should continue to implement the ecological protection measures，and increase the intensity about the protection and management of environment.Thereby to promote the coordinated sustainable development of land use and habitats.     

A generic tool for optimising land-use patterns and landscape structures

We present a flexible and easy to use genetic algorithm-based library for optimising the spatial configurations of land-use. LUPOlib, the Land-Use Pattern Optimisation-library, can be applied to a variety of spatial planning problems to derive target-driven scenarios that identify trade-offs between conflicting objectives and solve optimum allocation problems (e.g. allocation of reserve sites or management actions). A major novelty is that spatial changes are performed according to a patch topology that allows to simultaneously integrate changes of different landscape elements (e.g. in agricultural fields and linear changes along corridors). The objective function evaluation is based on a grid representation of the landscape where neighbourhood dependencies like lateral flows or the landscape pattern can explicitly be considered. A parameter file allows the user to control the optimisation, the modelled land-use changes, objective weightings and constraints as well as input data. Only the case study-specific objective function needs to be specified in the source code. LUPOlib has been applied so far in two case studies to find optimum trade-offs between habitat requirements of three different bird species and to analyse cost-effectiveness of management actions for species conservation. The results suggest that LUPOlib can be a useful tool to support management decisions. It could be used as an extension to a GIS and for spatially explicit decision support tools.