Spatial distribution of land use and its relationship with terrain factors in hilly area

Abstract

To understand the influences of terrain factors on the landscape pattern of land use in hilly areas, this paper, taking Huailai county, Hebei province as a case, studied the distribution characteristics of land use types on different terrains. The correlation between landscape pattern of land use and terrain environment was also qualitatively and quantitatively analyzed. The results showed that there was a significant terrain gradient in landscape pattern of land use.High terrain level of the zones was mainly distributed with woodland and grassland, and their distribution index was dominant, whereas, low terrain level was distributed with such types as urban and rural construction land, mining land, cultivated land, garden plot and water areas,which were affected and interfered strongly, and their distribution indexes were dominant. The landscape indices obtained by the moving window method qualitatively indicated a terrain gradient characteristic in landscape pattern, whereas the accumulative value of the first four axes of sort Canonical Correspondence Analysis(CCA) could explain 96.98% of variability.There existed a significant correlation between landscape pattern indices and terrain factors,and the correlation coefficient between terrain factors of the first axe and its indices features of the first axe reached 0.671. Therefore, terrain factors, including elevation, slope and relief strongly influenced the structure and spatial distribution of land use types in hilly areas.