Abstract
Vegetation patterns and spatial organization are influenced by the changing environmental conditions and human activities. However, the effect of environment on vegetation at different vegetation classification levels has been unclear. We conducted an analysis to explore the relationship between environment and vegetation in the land use/land cover (LULC), vegetation group, vegetation type, and formation and subformation levels using redundancy analysis with seven landscape metrics and 33 environmental factors in the upper reaches of the Heihe River basin in an arid area of China to clarify this uncertainty. Atmospheric counter radiation was the most important factor at the four levels. The effect of soil was the second determinant factor at three levels (except in vegetation formation and subformation level). The number of variables whose relationship to vegetation reached significant levels varied from 26 to 28, and 20 variables were the same at all four levels. The factors affecting vegetation were basically the same at vegetation group level and vegetation‐type level. It was sufficient to analyze the relationship between environmental and vegetation patterns only in LULC, vegetation group and vegetation formation and subformation level in mountainous regions; different factors should be considered at different vegetation levels.
Highlights
The appropriate interpretation of the relationship between vegetation types and environment is one of the main tasks of plant ecologists (Manley, 1961; Motzkin, Wilson, Foster, & Allen, 1999)
Other research focused on fractal dimensions and their relationship with environmental factors that varied between plant and landscape with a focus on phytoecology (Burrough, 1981)
Soil: soil moisture measured at 2 cm from surface (SM2), soil moisture measured at 100 cm from surface (SM100), topsoil gravel content (GRAVEL), topsoil bulk density (BD), reference soil depth (RD), topsoil reference bulk density (RBD), topsoil organic carbon (OC), topsoil pH (PH), cation exchange capacity of the clay fraction in the topsoil (CEC), topsoil base saturation (BS), topsoil salinity (ECE), soil texture, frozen soil (FS)
Summary
The appropriate interpretation of the relationship between vegetation types and environment (climate) is one of the main tasks of plant ecologists (Manley, 1961; Motzkin, Wilson, Foster, & Allen, 1999). Turnei, & O’neill, 1987; Meentemeyer & Box, 1987; Turner, O’neill, Gardner, & Milne, 1989) They are usually carried out at one level, mostly at the land use/land cover (LULC) level, and so are inadequate to illuminate the vegetation–environment relationship (Hejcmanovā-Nežerková & Hejcman, 2006; Peng et al, 2016). Other research focused on fractal dimensions and their relationship with environmental factors that varied between plant and landscape with a focus on phytoecology (Burrough, 1981) The problem with this method is that fractal dimensions can just indicate one aspect of vegetation patterns. We used a direct ordination approach to understand correlations between environmental factors and vegetation metrics in a highly heterogeneous environment at different scales and to find the differences in these correlations at different scales and their applications in resource management
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