This paper takes the Yimeng Mountainous Area,one of the most typical regions of the rocky area in northern China,as a case study.There are relatively few studies on the soil erosion monitoring and modeling in this region.According to the national professional standard of SL 190-2007 Standards for Classification and Gradation of Soil Erosion,this study aims to explore the characteristic of the vertical landscape of soil erosion in the vertical belts with each having an interval of 50 m,supported by the technology of GIS and RS and the data of Landsat TM image and relief map.Based on the analysis of the ecological process of soil erosion,this paper selects the proper landscape indexes,including area,patch density,aggregation index and perimeter-area fractal dimension. The result shows that there are evident laws in the vertical landscape of soil erosion.In the landscape level,PD and SEI(Soil Erosion Index) increase at first and then decrease with the rise of the elevation,while AI is on the contrary,and D increases continually.So two relatively stable elevation ranges and one dramatic change range can be identified.The region between the belts of 50 and 200 was regarded as one stable area with low erosion intensity,in which patches are featured by low fragmentation,high connectivity and regular shape,indicating human activities emerged on the landscape.And the other stable area was in the range of 400 to 800 belts,where natural factors dominate the landscape with high patch density,low aggregation and irregular shapes.The soil erosion landscapes changed dramatically in the area ranging from 200 to 400 belts,and with the rise of elevation,the effect of natural factors were increased rapidly.In the class level,the landscape pattern changed differently.The soil erosion landscapes of the minimal and slight intensity have the similar trend with the rise of elevation,and that of the intensity of intense and very intense were almost the same,and the difference between the above two changing trends mainly exists in the area lower than the 300 and the area higher than the 500 belt.The landscape of moderate soil erosion intensity can be considered as the transfer regime between those of the two categories mentioned above.