Abstract
Vegetation plays an important role in improving and restoring fragile ecological environments. In the Antaibao opencast coal mine, located in a loess area, the eco-environment has been substantially disturbed by mining activities, and the relationship between the vegetation and environmental factors is not very clear. Therefore, it is crucial to understand the effects of soil and topographic factors on vegetation restoration to improve the fragile ecosystems of damaged land. An investigation of the soil, topography and vegetation in 50 reclamation sample plots in Shanxi Pingshuo Antaibao opencast coal mine dumps was performed. Statistical analyses in this study included one-way ANOVA and significance testing using SPSS 20.0, and multivariate techniques of detrended correspondence analysis (DCA) and redundancy analysis (RDA) using CANOCO 4.5. The RDA revealed the environmental factors that affected vegetation restoration. Various vegetation and soil variables were significantly correlated. The available K and rock content were good explanatory variables, and they were positively correlated with tree volume. The effects of the soil factors on vegetation restoration were higher than those of the topographic factors.
Highlights
Vegetation plays an important role in improving and restoring fragile ecological environments
These opencast coal mines are primarily located in the vulnerable environments of northwestern China, such as Shanxi Province, Inner Mongolia, and Shaanxi Province[1,2]
The present study indicated that the available K was the variable with the highest explanatory power compared with the other soil nutrient variables, followed by total N and soil organic matter
Summary
Vegetation plays an important role in improving and restoring fragile ecological environments. In the Antaibao opencast coal mine, located in a loess area, the eco-environment has been substantially disturbed by mining activities, and the relationship between the vegetation and environmental factors is not very clear. It is crucial to understand the effects of soil and topographic factors on vegetation restoration to improve the fragile ecosystems of damaged land. The Pingshuo Antaibao opencast coal mine began in 1985 in Shanxi Province and is located in the loess area of northwestern China. It is very important to understand the effect of soil and topographic factors on vegetation restoration for land reclamation and ecological restoration in opencast coal mining areas. Vegetation restoration affects the soil properties at different scales, and the soil characteristics and topographic features influence vegetation development[9]. A previous study has found that vegetation restoration has little effect on the soil organic matter and available nitrogen in abandoned wasteland, and this effect depends on the restoration model of artificial vegetation[14]
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