Spatial priority conservation areas for vegetation habitat across the Upper Reaches of Min River located in Sichuan Province, China

Abstract

Considered as a hotspot for biodiversity in the upstream of Yangtze River, many vegetation habitats have been seriously damaged in Upper Reaches of Min River located in Sichuan Province, China due to the continuous deterioration of ecosystems. This work aims to define important protected areas with higher vegetation habitat suitability index. Through integrating the spatial distribution of vegetation habitat suitability (HS) index into systematic conservation planning, this study constructed spatial priority conservation areas of vegetation habitat under different protection targets in the Upper Reaches of Min River, China. In this regard, effective information regarding vegetation HS and its priority conservation planning responded to conservation target level changes and boundary length effect provide useful support for diverse stakeholders in vegetation habitat planning, management and policies. The southeastern places played an important role in the priority conservation areas for vegetation habitat, and there were more conservation areas located in east of study site than west. As increasing of target levels (ranged 10%–90% percentages of summing amount for vegetation HS index at watershed scale), the spatial priority conservation areas for vegetation habitat gradually extended from the south to the north. The spatial structure of priority conservation areas for vegetation habitat with boundary length effect was more compact than that without boundary length effect. The total priority conservation areas with boundary length effect were approximate to those without boundary length effect, but the total boundary length of former was far less than that of latter. It suggested that integrating boundary length effect to systematic conservation planning of vegetation habitat could produce more aggregated conservation patches and increase connectivity among patches. The total priority conservation areas for vegetation habitat were traded off against total boundary length of reserve networks. It indicated that this tradeoff information could help stakeholder to reasonably allocate investment to maintain reserve network under different target levels. The proposed approach could provide useful information to assess the responses of priority conservation areas for vegetation habitat to different protected targets and boundary length effect, and also guarantee ecosystem sustainability across watershed.