A study of the Distribution of Sand Sheet on Some Pastures in the Western Desert of Iraq

Abstract

This research aims to track the spatial extensions of the sand accumulations significantly over the past few years, on the pastoral lands of two regions in the Western Desert of Iraq for the years (2000-2005-2013-2019), depending on the techniques of remote sensing and geographic information system, which covered an area of (1826.5 km2), the satellite visuals of the Landsat sensors (OLI, TM) were used for the selected years of observations, within path 171, row 36 and 37, and the program to build classification equations within the ArcGis9.3 software environment for classification and mapping from the US Geological Survey website analysis, treatment, classification, improvement and calculation of the spread areas of sand accumulation, the results showed the affected areas in the north of Al-Rutba reached 304,443,268,280 km2, either in part of Wadi Al-Ratqah reached 289,346,191,113 Square kilometers, 34 grazing plant species belong to 12 families, The vegetative density ranged between 3.7 – 36.0 plant. m-2, the vegetation coverage was between 9.5-73.8 cm.m-2 and the total biomass was 28.1 g. m-2, noting the low values in the sand accumulations. This study emphasizes the need to develop policies, procedures and future plans to reduce the phenomenon of sand accumulation on pasturelands in the study areas.