Human Activities Introduced Degenerations of Wetlands (1975–2013) across the Sanjiang Plain North of the Wandashan Mountain, China

Jing Xie,Zhi Ding,Ming Lu,Xiao Liu,Yeran Sun

doi:10.3390/land10121361

Abstract

Human-induced dramatic loss and fragmentation of wetlands need further understanding through historical backtracking analysis at a geographical landscape scale. In this study, we investigated time-series wetlands maps from 1975, 1983, 1989, 2000, 2006, and 2013 derived from Landsat images based on the object-oriented classification of wetlands across the Sanjiang Plain north of the Wandashan Mountains. The spatial and temporal changes in the wetlands that occurred at different time periods and the Euclidean distances between artificial land-use types and natural land-cover areas were evaluated for their impact. Our results showed that wetland was the dominant landscape in 1975; however, arable land became the main land coverage in 2013 owing to severe changes in agricultural development over the past decades. The closer to arable land, the greater the wetland loss during the entire investigated period; agriculture activities were the dominant driving force for the degradation of wetlands based on landscape changes; secondary was the rapid expansion in building land use (i.e., human settlement, transportation, and establishment of irrigation canals). More specifically, the rapid loss of wetland areas over 1975–2000 was mainly owing to extensive agricultural reclamation. The mitigated loss of wetland areas over 2000–2013 was because of the protection and restored implementation of wetlands under governmental policies. The wetlands of the study area suffered severe human disturbance, and our analysis may help explain the loss process of wetlands, but more effective management and administration is still needed to address the issues around the balance between agricultural production and wetland protection for further sustainable development.

Highlights

Wetlands are constitutive components of global ecosystems, providing essential habitats for both flora and fauna and supporting a high diversity of plants and wildlifeWetlands are constitutive components of 6%global providing essential hab‐funcspecies [1,2]
In this paper, based on remotely sensed data sets using geographic information system (GIS) approaches and statistical methods, the spatial and temporal trajectories of wetland reduction and LULC change were analyzed in the Sanjiang Plain north of the Wandashan Mountains, China
Wetlands occupied 63.0% of the study area as the dominant landscape in 1975 but fell to 13.8% in 2013 as lost wetlands were converted to other land covers, especially arable land coverage

Summary

Introduction

Wetlands are constitutive components of global ecosystems, providing essential habitats for both flora and fauna and supporting a high diversity of plants and wildlifeWetlands are constitutive components of 6%global providing essential hab‐funcspecies [1,2]. Though occupying less than of ecosystems, land surface area, many critical itats for both flora and fauna and supporting a high diversity of plants and wildlife species tions and services are provided by wetlands [3], such as water supplies, carbon storage,. A number of studies have shown that changes in wetservices are provided by wetlands [3], such as water supplies, carbon storage, and habitats lands contribute to climate change from a regional to a global scale [6,7] and directly impact for wildlife, etc. To better protect our living environment in cities and ute to climate change from a regional to a global scale [6,7] and directly impact worldwide the countryside [10,11] by following the United Nations sustainable development goals, it biotic diversities [8,9]. To better protect our living environment in cities and the country‐

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion