Abstract
The vegetation changes in the area of the Russian part of the Lake Baikal water basin for the period 2010–2018 were investigated using MCD12C1 land cover. The decline in swamp systems area began in 2012 and continued until 2015, after which it partially recovered during the heavy rain season in 2018. During the period of 2010–2018, the area covered by forests did not exceed 20.3% of the Baikal basin of the total portion of the Baikal basin under study. Deforestation began in 2013 and continued until 2017. Over 2013–2018, the forest level decreased by 12.1% compared to the forest state in 2013. The analysis of summer rainfalls and aridity indexes was performed by using CRU TS and GPCC climatic datasets. It is shown that the interannual variations of precipitation and aridity changes are determined by the variability of the global circulation of moist air masses. The MCD64A1 (burned area) and MCD14ML (active fires) MODIS products were used for investigation of the influence of wildfires on vegetation changes. The spatial hotspot distributions and burned areas in general correspond to aridity zones, but they cannot explain the 20-fold increase in the number of wildfires. Most of the hotspot locations are away from settlements, roads, and loggings, in difficult-to-access mountainous areas, as well as in the low-inhabited areas of Siberia. We assume that the nature of such ignitions includes dry thunderstorms, pyrocumulus lightning, or remote impact.
Highlights
To understand and respond to global environmental changes, such as global warming and biodiversity loss, a timely assessment of deforestation and land-cover degradation is required
The MCD64A1 and MCD14ML MODIS products were used for investigation of the influence of wildfires on vegetation changes
We investigated the changes in land cover nearby Lake Baikal
Summary
To understand and respond to global environmental changes, such as global warming and biodiversity loss, a timely assessment of deforestation and land-cover degradation is required. We investigated the changes in land cover nearby Lake Baikal. Lake Baikal is the deepest and largest freshwater reservoir on Earth, holding 20% of the world’s total unfrozen fresh water. The lake is fed by an inflow of water from areas lying east and south of the Baikal (Figure 1). The largest river, Selenga, running into Lake Baikal, provides up to half of the annual inflow of water. The water regime of the river Selenga is characterized by low spring flood, rainfall floods in summer, and moderate inflow by autumn–winter. The changes in water inflow into Lake Baikal and runoff fluctuations in the Selenga river basin were studied in References [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9]
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