In mountainous streams, transverse hydraulic structures disrupt longitudinal connectivity and simplify microhabitats, thereby negatively affecting aquatic ecosystems. Recently, the removal of such structures has been increasingly recognized as an important measure for aquatic ecosystem restoration. However, studies on how ecosystems recover after such removal, particularly in protected mountainous streams, remain limited. The present study aimed to evaluate the ecological effects of removing a small and dysfunctional weir on benthic macroinvertebrate communities, and to quantitatively assess the restoration effects on a mountain stream ecosystem in the Ganeungoraegol Valley, Seoraksan National Park, South Korea. The weir was removed in November 2021, and subsequent changes in benthic macroinvertebrate communities were monitored over 10 field surveys conducted from August 2021 to 2024. Survey sites included two impacted sites and two reference sites selected based on the expected ecological influence of the weir structure. In total, 85 taxa were identified. Although both species richness and individual density declined temporarily immediately after removal, gradual recovery was observed thereafter. Notably, the impacted sites exhibited marked improvements in species diversity, richness, and community stability, likely due to enhanced habitat heterogeneity and restored longitudinal connectivity. Community index analysis revealed a decrease in dominance index and increase in diversity and evenness indices, in- dicating progressive stabilization of the biological assemblages. The findings demonstrate that benthic macroinvertebrates are key bioindicators for assessing the outcomes of weir removal in mountainous streams. The results could facilitate ecological restoration efforts in protected areas such as national parks. Continuous monitoring and improvement of residual structures are recommended to support long-term ecological recovery. The present study offers a scientific basis for similar restoration projects in comparable ecosystems.

The long-tailed goral (Naemorhedus caudatus) faces significant threats from habitat loss and fragmentation and is classified as a Class I endangered species by the Ministry of Environment in South Korea and vulnerable by the IUCN. Understanding the behavioral ecology of this species is crucial for effective conservation and protective measures. Using GPS collars, this study investigated the home range sizes and activity patterns of nine rehabilitated long-tailed gorals (four males and five females) across three regions (Yanggu, Seoraksan National Park, and Uljin) from 2014 to 2016. The 95% minimum convex polygon (MCP) home range averaged 0.64 ± 0.33 km2, while the 50% MCP home range averaged 0.15 ± 0.05 km2. The male home ranges were larger than the female home ranges. Additionally, the home ranges varied seasonally, with the smallest recorded in winter. The activity pattern of long-tailed gorals was predominantly crepuscular and diurnal, with no significant sexual differences. There were no significant differences in activity during spring, summer, and autumn; however, activity in winter differed significantly from that in the other seasons. The data provided on the home ranges and activity patterns of the species will serve as a basis for developing effective conservation and management strategies to protect this endangered species. By elucidating the spatial and temporal behaviors of long-tailed gorals, this study enhances our understanding of the ecological needs of the species and helps develop precise conservation measures.

In this study, remote sensing technology was used to assess the carbon stocks of forest vegetation in the Khan Khentii Strictly Protected Area in Mongolia and Seoraksan National Park in South Korea. The aboveground biomass of the Khan Khentii Strictly Protected Area in 2021 was estimated to be approximately 65 million tons, which is equivalent to approximately 46 million tons of carbon. By contrast, the aboveground biomass of Seoraksan National Park in the same year was approximately 6.07 million tons, with a carbon stock of approximately 4.34 million tons. The carbon stock per unit area was higher in Seoraksan National Park (104.23 ton C/ha vs. 51.78 ton C/ha in the Khan Khentii Strictly Protected Area). The biomass of the Khan Khentii Strictly Protected Area had decreased by approximately 4 million tons since 2010, whereas that at Seoraksan National Park showed no significant difference over the same period. These results suggest that the Khan Khentii Strictly Protected Area could emit approximately 939,000 tons of carbon dioxide annually. The findings of this study are expected to serve as an important reference for management of the forest ecosystem and the formulation of climate change response policies in both countries.

To understand the water level fluctuation characteristics at the groundwater observation network installed and operated in the area around Seoraksan National Park, a time series analysis of long-term data of groundwater levels observed in the network from 2012 to 2021 was performed. The observation network comprises three locations, all installed in the bedrock aquifer, and periodic inspections and management are carried out by the relevant operating agency. According to the linear analysis results, the groundwater level decreased by -89.7 cm/yr at the Goseong-Inheung Observatory, whereas it rose by 3.7 cm/yr at the Goseong-Toseong Observatory. A strong autocorrelation was observed among the three observatories. In particular, at the Goseong-Inheung Observatory, the time delay was found to be approximately 8 times longer than that at the Goseong- Toseong and Sokcho-Nohak observatories, whereas the time delay of precipitation was similar to the time delay of Goseong-Toseong and Sokcho-Nohak. These results were judged to have strong linearity and memory effects with the groundwater level data. Analysis of the cross-correlation function between rainfall and groundwater levels showed that Goseong-Inheung had a certain degree of cross-correlation with rainfall, with a delay of 12 days. If the discharge in major rivers of Seoraksan National Park is continuously monitored, researches on water resources using river discharge and groundwater levels are expected to be actively conducted.

In Jangsudae of Seoraksan National Park, South Korea, 14 mammal species have been listed, including ten medium- and large-sized species; additionally, this region is an important habitat for the endangered long-tailed goral (Naemorhedus caudatus). In this study, a camera trap survey was conducted over 103 monitoring days at 18 sites in Jangsudae to evaluate the minimum trapping effort (MTE) needed to detect the ten listed mammal species. The most photographed species were the long-tailed goral, wild boar (Sus scrofa), and Asian badger (Meles leucurus), accounting for 77.1% (n = 366) of the total independent photographs. Long-tailed goral, the most frequently captured mammal species (44.8%), was captured at 17 camera sites (relative abundance index = 206.8). According to the rarefaction analysis, 1840 camera days (102.2 monitoring days at 18 camera sites) were required to photograph all ten resident species. Moreover, at least 1010 and 664 camera days were required to detect 95% and 90% of the ten residential species, respectively. MTE was evaluated in summer when wild species were highly detectable owing to their high activity. Future studies should evaluate MTE through one-year long-term monitoring that includes all four seasons, and compare the results with those of this study.

The purpose of this study is to add to our understanding of actual traveler interest in the tourism market by investigating the causal conditions of tourist destination attributes on tourist satisfaction. Prior to proceeding, natural tourist destinations that were recommended 5 times in a row in South Korea's top 100 must-see tourist destinations were chosen as the study's target. Seoraksan National Park, Hallasan National Park, Suncheonman Wetland (Suncheonman National Garden), Nami Island, and Udo are among them. For an analysis of the online reviews of these five well-known tourist destinations, topic modeling was used, and the latent dirichlet allocation (LDA) technique with TF-IDF weight was used to create a comprehensive list of the topics posted by Tripadvisor reviewers. Making scientific inferences about nature tourism phenomena, such as Fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (FsQCA), to better predict and explain real-world nature tourism phenomena using a configurational approach, is becoming more popular. The purpose of this article is to identify the key contribution and knowledge structure of tourist destination selection attributes as well as their overall satisfaction research using complexity theory and FsQCA. The primary goal of this study is to investigate not only the influence of tourist destination selection attributes as a single variable in online reviews, but also how these selection attributes influence tourist satisfaction with various combinations of causal conditions. These findings are useful in understanding individual travelers' perceptions of tourist destinations as well as their overall satisfaction.

National parks are geographically located in mountain areas, and natural disaster of risk factors are scattered, and damage to human life and property is continuously occurring due to various safety accidents. This study tried to suggest an efficient trail safety management plan by comparing and analyzing the distribution and characteristics of risk factors in Bukhansan and Seoraksan National Park, which show similar characteristics, based on the trail safety evaluation data collected from the previous studies. In Bukhansan National Park, risk factors due to safety accidents such as fall and slipping are very high, whereas in Seoraksan National Park, the distribution of risk factors for falling rocks is higher than safety accidents. These results improved the existing standardized policy direction for trail safety management and derived the necessity of establishing subdivided standards according to environmental factors such as geology, topography, and visitor characteristics, even in national parks with similar environments. This study is expected to contribute to the improvement of trail safety management technology, enhancement of expertise, and prevention of damage to human life and property due to systematic safety management.

Analysis of Characteristics of Debris Flow Susceptibility in Rugged Mountain Range in the Seoraksan National Park, Korea

Spatial Distribution of Evergreen Coniferous Dead Trees in Seoraksan National Park -In the Case of Northwestern Ridge-

The objectives of this study were to select morphological keys for the identification of individual endangered long-tailed gorals through analysis of photographic data and to use these morphological keys to determine the number and population composition of gorals living in the Osaek Region of Seoraksan National Park. Amongst 8149 photos taken using 73 cameras in the Osaek Region, 2057 photos of faces and horns were analysed. The presence and absence of horns, shape of the horns, proportion of the ring to the length of the horn and facial colour pattern were selected as morphological keys to identify individual gorals. To verify the accuracy of the morphological keys for identifying gorals, a blind test was performed on gorals residing in the sanctuary of the Yanggu Goral Restoration Center. The test revealed that the population and age of gorals were discerned correctly by the morphological keys, but there was a 12.5% error in discriminating between sexes in gorals aged over 10 years. Fifty-six gorals were identified from 2057 pictures, based on the morphological keys and methods developed in this study. The population of 56 individuals consisted of 43 individuals aged over 2 years (subadult or adult) and 13 offspring aged less than 2 years, with a ratio of 3.3:1. Of the total 56 individuals, 45% were adults aged 10 years or older, 18% were adults aged 3–10 years, 7% were subadults aged 2–3 years, 23% were offspring aged less than 2 years and 7% were individuals aged 2 years or older, whose age and sex could not be confirmed. The sex ratio of males to females was 1.17:1, with a corrected sex ratio of 1:1 considering the 12.5% error rate for gorals aged over 10 years, amongst the 39 gorals aged over 2 years.

BackgroundKorean wild boars (Sus scrofa coreanus Heude), because of their adaptability, are a widespread large mammal; however, they sometimes cause problems by invading farms and eating the crops, creating insufficiencies of some foods in South Korea. To understand the diet composition of Korean wild boars according to sex and body size, we collected their feces from Mt. Jeombongsan, Seoraksan National Park, South Korea. The sizes of fecal samples were measured, and genomic DNA was extracted from the samples. We amplified specific loci targeting plants (rbcL and trnL) and animals (COI) to detect the food sources of this omnivore and amplified the ZF and SRY regions to determine the sex.ResultsIn the wild boar feces, Rosaceae and Bryophyte were the most frequently detected plant food sources at the family level and Diptera and Haplotaxida were the most frequently detected animal food sources at the order level. As a result of sex determination, the sex ratio of wild boars collected in the Mt. Jeombongsan area was approximately 1:1. Our result suggested that there is no significant difference between the diet composition of male and female boars. Based on the average cross-sectional area of the feces, the top 25% were classified into the large body size group and the bottom 25% were classified into the small body size group. The large body size group mainly preferred Actinidiaceae, and the small body size group most frequently consumed Fagaceae. The diet of the large body size group was more diverse than the small body size group.ConclusionsOur results showed that the wild boars preferred Rosaceae, especially Sanguisorba and Filipendula, as plant food sources, and Diptera and Coleoptera of Insecta as animal food sources. Based on the results, the dietary preferences of wild boar appear to be distinguished by not their sex but their body size. Our study could help to elucidate the feeding ecology and population structure of wild boar, as well as address conservation and management issues.

ABSTRACT The long-tailed goral (also called the Amur goral) Naemorhedus caudatus (subfamily Caprinae), a vulnerable and protected species designated by IUCN and CITES, has sharply been declining in the population size and is now becoming critically endangered in South Korea. This species has been conserved as a natural monument by the Korean Cultural Heritage Administration since 1968. In this study, using 78 fecal DNA samples with a non-invasive genetic approach, we assessed the genetic integrity and individual identification-based population size for the goral population from Seoraksan National Park representing the largest wild population in Korea. Using the successfully isolated 38 fecal DNA, phylogeographic and population genetic analyses were performed with mitochondrial DNA control region (CR) sequences and nine microsatellite loci. We found seven CR haplotypes, of which five were unique to the Seoraksan population, considering previously determined haplotypes in Korean populations. The Seoraksan population showed higher haplotype diversity (0.777 ± 0.062) and mean number of alleles (4.67 ± 1.563) relative to southern populations in Korea reported from previous studies, with no signal of a population bottleneck. Microsatellite-based individual identification estimate based on probability of identity (PID) indicated a population size of ≥30 in this population. Altogether, we suggest that for future management efforts of this species in the Seoraksan National Park, conserving its genetic integrity as an ‘endemic’ lineage, and curbing a decrease in its number through mitigating habitat destruction might be key to secure the population for the long term.

The assessment of spatio-temporal patterns of visitors’ activities in national parks is essential to mitigate impacts to natural resources as well as manage experiences. With the use of a GPS-based mobile exercise application dataset, this study explored the spatio-temporal patterns of visitors’ activities in Seoraksan National Park, South Korea. A total of 1,206 anonymous mobile application users along with their 2,571 activity start points were acquired for January 2015 to December 2015. GIS-based hot spot analyses were employed to analyze the spatial patterns of activity points over time. Results indicated activity hot spots for hours (i.e., dawn, morning, afternoon, and evening) as well as risky points (i.e., falling-rocks, risk of structure collapse, or lightning) during dark hours (night) across seasons. Findings from this study can assist managers to allocate their spatio-temporal park management resources effectively to minimize environmental impacts, and enhance visitor experiences and safety. Furthermore, GPS-based mobile exercise application can be used as an alternative tool to assess spatio-temporal use of visitors in national parks.

Visitors’ behavior in national parks can be influenced by seasonal variations in climate and preferred activities. Seasonality can produce different space consumption patterns, and impact visitor experience and natural resource use. The purpose of this study was to explore the seasonal spatial patterns of visitors’ activities using a mobile exercise application within the context of Seoraksan National Park in South Korea. A dataset composed of 5142 starting and ending points of 2639 activities (hiking and walking) created by 1206 mobile exercise application users (January–December 2015) were collected from a leading mobile exercise application operator. GIS-based spatial analytical techniques were used to analyze the spatial patterns of activity points across seasons and days (weekdays/weekends). Results indicated considerable seasonal and daily variations in activity distribution and hot spots (i.e., locations of potential congestion or crowding). The findings enable park managers to mitigate negative impacts to natural resources as well as enhance visitors’ experiences. Also, it allows potential visitors to decide when to visit certain sites via mobile application to ensure optimal conditions. Furthermore, the GPS-based exercise mobile application can be used as a new methodological approach to understand spatio-temporal patterns of visitors’ behavior within national parks and other natural protected areas.

This study focused on establishing a framework for the designation of a conservation area reflecting an ecotope concept, and its application to Korea’s Seoraksan National Park. Taking into consideration the mountainous topography of the study area, the watershed was chosen as the planning unit, and ecotope mapping was carried out to identify topographic and biological features. For the evaluation of the state of recent use, the trail index and the distribution status of tour and management facilities were used. These features were processed using Marxan with Zones. As a result, the optimal solution of scenario 1 was selected as the final one following detailed verification of the area ratio and grouping of the Park Nature Conservation Area (zone A, 76.7%) and the Park Nature Environment Area (I) (zone B, 14.3%), the inclusion ratio of biotope grade I (95.2%) and the satisfied shortfall value of the conservation indicators. In the overlap analysis between the optimal solution and recent zonation, most of the features included in the suggested scenario were found to be correctly distributed according to the intensity of conservation. Furthermore, the northern parts of the watershed which include sub-alpine vegetation with the Baekdudaegan ridge as its ecological axis was newly separated into the Park Conservation Area. This verification confirmed the improvement of recent zonation through the concrete criteria of ecotope mapping.

Mountainous disasters such as landslides and debris flow are difficult to forecast. Debris flow in particular often flows along the valley until it reaches the road or residential area, causing casualties and huge damages. In this study, the researchers selected Seoraksan National Park area located at Inje County (Inje-gun), Gangwon Province-where many mountainous disasters occur due to localized torrential downpours-for the damage reduction and cause analysis of the area experiencing frequent mountainous disasters every year. Then, the researchers conducted the field study and constructed geospatial information data by GIS method to analyze the characteristics of the disaster-occurring area. Also, to extract more precise geographic parameters, the researchers scanned debris flow triggering area through terrestrial LiDAR and constructed 3D geographical data. LiDAR geographical data was then compared with the existing numerical map to evaluate its precision and made the comparative analysis with the geographic data before and after the disaster occurrence. In the future, it will be utilized as basic data for risk analysis of mountainous disaster or disaster reduction measures through a fine-grid topographical map.

This study examined visitor use of Seoraksan National Park in Korea by seniors. The objectives were to analyze the effects of services and facilities on satisfaction and behavioral intention (to revisit and recommend to others) and explore gender differences. This study was conducted onsite in 2014 and data were collected from seniors (> 60 years old). The study variables included travel behavior, visitation experiences, service and facility preferences, and socio-economic characteristics. Study results (N=186) showed 50% male and 50% female respondents, visitors came mostly with family or friends; stayed at the park less than 24 hours, and visited 1–2 times a year. The major purposes of their visits were hiking, sightseeing, and health. Results showed that visitors are mostly satisfied with their national park experience and significant predictors of satisfaction included: size of the parking lot, well-maintained trails, and convenient rest areas; intention to recommend the park to others and intention to revisit were predicted by trails. Gender differences were found on five variables: trail, hiking information center, visitor center, camping site, and shelter, with female satisfaction scores lower on each of these items. This research contributes to a better understanding of senior national park visitor preferences and provides needed information so park managers can improve services and facilities and meet the future needs for a growing and active population of seniors in Korea. Future research should examine a more representative sample of seniors at Korean national parks and assess the benefits of time spent in the natural environment.

Abstract With data from GPS collars, we analyzed the behavioral characteristics of the endangered long-tailed goral (n=10) in three locations (Seoraksan and Woraksan National Park, and the Uljin area), from March 2007 to May 2014. We found significant differences in the seasonal home range size of females, but not in males. Additionally, females significantly differed in their habitat altitudes depending on the season, with higher altitude habitats used in the summer and lower altitude habitats used in the winter. Males also exhibited this pattern, but it was not significant. Thus, males’ seasonal home range was largest in summer and the smallest in spring, but females’ home range was largest in spring and autumn and smallest in summer and winter. In monthly home range, male’s home range was largest in October to November during their mating season, the size of female’s home range dramatically decreased in May, June, July due to giving birth. In habitat characteristics, seasonal and monthly use of altitude was highest in summer and lowest in winter for both of males and females. So, we found that there were differences in seasonal and monthly habitat use for both of males and females. Our findings will contribute to a better understanding of long-tailed goral restoration ecology.

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