Abstract
Abstract. Vegetation and moisture are two key factors of soil genesis and development. An evaluation of the relationship between satellite-observed normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) data as a proxy for vegetation greenness and water availability (rainfall and soil moisture) can greatly improve our understanding of how vegetation greenness responds to water availability fluctuations. Using Sen and Pearson's correlation methods, we analyzed the spatiotemporal variation of vegetation greenness for both the entire year and the growing season (GS, 4–10) in northern China from 1982 to 2006. Although vegetation greenness and soil moisture during the study period changed significantly for the entire study area, there was no change in rainfall. Linear correlation analysis between NDVI and rainfall revealed higher correlations using data for all seasons. Higher correlations for NDVI and soil moisture were obtained using growing season data. This study highlights how strongly vegetation greenness responds to water availability dynamics, especially in the growing season period.
Highlights
Water availability is generally assumed to be one of the most important parameters for vegetation greenness (Zhang et al, 2010; Huber et al, 2011; Niu et al, 2015)
Because soil moisture data were produced by models rather than field data, we focused on rainfall to analyze the greenness and water availability lag factors
This study has evaluated the trends and correlations between normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), soil moisture, and lagged rainfall data during the observation period (1982–2006)
Summary
Water availability is generally assumed to be one of the most important parameters for vegetation greenness (Zhang et al, 2010; Huber et al, 2011; Niu et al, 2015). Satellite-derived normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) data, which potentially provide much greater spatial and temporal coverage, have recently played an important role in investigating the relationship between NDVI and water availability (rainfall and soil moisture) around the world. Soil genesis and development is to a great extent determined by the vegetation as a control for soil erosion and contribute to the biological diversity of the soils (Cerdà, 1998; Yu and Jia, 2014; Beyene, 2015; Laberge et al, 2015; Keesstra et al, 2016b). Much work has been done studying the relationship between vegetation greenness and rainfall (Hellden and Tottrup, 2008; Huang et al, 2012; Mu et al, 2012). The present study analyzed the trend and relationship between monthly vegetation green-
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