Abstract
AbstractThe land use and land cover (LULC) changes and the implications of soil and irrigation water salinity have adverse effects on crop production and the ecosystems of arid and semiarid regions. In this study, an attempt has been made to analyze and monitor the LULC changes using multitemporal Landsat data for years 1986, 1998, 2007, and 2016 in Al-Ahsa Oasis, Saudi Arabia. In addition, efforts were made to measure the spatial distribution of soil and irrigation water salinity along the oasis. The supervised maximum likelihood classification method was applied to classify the individual images independently. Moreover, soil samples were collected at surface soil depth from the selected LULC types, namely, date palm, croplands, and bare land. Also, groundwater samples were collected from bore wells located in agricultural farms. The spatial distribution of the soil salinity (Ece) and irrigation water salinity (ECiw) was classified based on the Food and Agriculture Organization guidelines. The results showed that significant changes in LULC patterns have occurred during 1986–2016 in the study area. The ECewas found higher in date palm compared with cropland and bare land. However, the spatial distribution of the ECiwover the oasis indicated that 94% of irrigation water ranged between moderate and severe salinity risk. The study concludes that salinity management practices need to be developed in the study area aiming to sustain crop yields, improve soil properties, and minimize the environmental impacts of LULC changes on the ecosystem of Al-Ahsa Oasis.
Highlights
The study of land use and land cover (LULC) changes is essential for land management, environment, and strategy formulation regarding planning activities
Based on the produced LULC maps (Figure 4), it was found that date palm and bare land were the dominant
The significant spatial expansion in bare land and the large decrease in date palm were observed in the LULC map of the year 1998
Summary
The study of land use and land cover (LULC) changes is essential for land management, environment, and strategy formulation regarding planning activities. Mallick et al [2] analyzed the LULC transformation in the Abha region during 2000–2010 They found that the sparse vegetation and water bodies decreased from 48.5 to 39.3 km and 0.3 to 0.1 km, respectively, whereas the built-up area increased from 17.0 to 36.4 km. In the Al-Baha region, the LULC dynamics were mapped by Mahmoud and Alazba [7] in the period 1975–2010 Their classified maps showed four main classes: bare soil, sparsely vegetated, forest and shrubland, and irrigated cropland. They reported that bare soil increased during 1975–1995 and decline during 1995–2010 due to the construction of rainwater harvesting dams in the region. Significant changes were observed in irrigated cropland during the entire study period
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