Conceptualizing smoothness and density as landscape elements in visual resource management

Several dilemmas stand in the way of meeting the goals of visual resource management. The landscape is rich in potential qualities that can be assessed, but the choice of appropriate attributes is more difficult. What is readily measured is not necessarily what is most useful to examine. Furthermore, what is readily discernible from eye-level photographs may not be readily available as mapped information. Two attributes, smoothness and density, are the focus of the current study. Their choice is based on prior empirical efforts and their promise as qualities that could be translated to mapped (e.g. geographic information system; GIS) form. Though intuitively straight-forward, definitions of these concepts in terms that are amenable to computer-based spatial format posed a variety of challenges. The present effort has developed working definitions of these attributes that make them scorable in other contexts and by other researchers. Further, an initial exploration of the relationship of these attributes to different landcover types suggests that although each landcover type tends to have its own characteristic range, these attributes also permit meaningful distinctions within these categories.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/31270/1/0000176.pd

Social-Ecological Impacts of China’s Payments for Ecosystem Services Programs on Land Use, Migration and Livelihoods

Payments for ecosystem services (PES) has emerged as an innovative approach to address the problems in the human-environment nexus. Understanding the ecological and socio-economic impacts of PES programs is essential to the sustainability of environmental goods and services conserved by these programs. The Conversion of Cropland to Forest Program (CCFP) and the Ecological Welfare Forest Program (EWFP) were among the major PES programs initiated in China in the late 1990s. This dissertation draws on data collected from household surveys to investigate human adaptation to the socio-economic and environmental changes in Tiantangzhai Township, Anhui, China, where both CCFP and EWFP were implemented. I found that the PES programs, together with other factors, both directly and indirectly affected cropland abandonment, individual out-migration and rural livelihoods. Proximity of land parcels to the nearest CCFP and EWFP forests increases the likelihood of cropland abandonment. Households receiving higher EWFP payments are associated with higher probabilities of cropland abandonment. I also found that the CCFP and EWFP have different effects on individual’s out-migration decisions. The CCFP compensation increases the likelihood of out-migration partly because it not only covers initial migrating costs but also releases farm labor after enrolling their cropland in the program. However, the EWFP compensation has an opposite though far smaller effect on out-migration. Out-migration is also affected by other variables such as individual attributes, household characteristics and community factors. Lastly, CCFP households have a higher and more diversified sources of income than households without CCFP. CCFP households diversify their livelihoods by investing in agriculture (intensifying land use), raising farm animals and using forest resources. In addition, income inequality among CCFP households is greater than that among nonparticipants. Remittances increase total income inequality for all households regardless whether their participation in the CCFP. Local off-farm income, however, have the opposite effects for the two types of households. A random effect regression analysis suggests EWFP payments significantly increase total income and add to income inequality while CCFP payments make little contribution to income inequality. Overall, these findings provide valuable inputs for policy makers aiming to achieve sustainability for PES programs in the future.Doctor of Philosoph

Land Cover mapping based on Hierarchical Decision Trees

The ability to monitor land cover changes can be very useful for resource management, urban planning, forest fire identification, among plenty of other applications. The topic of remote sensing has been studied for a long time, with many different solutions that typically use satellites or aircraft to obtain multi-spectral imagery and further analyse it. The entity responsible for monitoring land use and land cover in Portugal is Direção- Geral do Território (DGT) which periodically produces a document called Land Use and Land Cover Map (Carta de Uso e Ocupação do Solo (COS), in Portuguese). This document uses imagery with high spatial resolution of 0,25 m and has a minimum mapping unit of 1 ha, however, it is only produced every few years because it is manually curated by experts. This hinders the ability to closely monitor relevant land changes that occur more frequently or rapidly. In this dissertation, several classifiers were developed in a hierarchical manner to address some of COS drawbacks. The classifiers used were based on decision trees which were trained using satellite imagery collected from Sentinel-2 satellite constellation. Although having a lower spatial resolution than COS, they can automatically classify land cover in some minutes every time a new set of Sentinel-2 imagery is collected, in this case each 5 days. Cloud coverage might make some of these images unusable but nonetheless, the temporal resolution is still far greater than COS. However, automatic classification is not as accurate as manual classification. The produced classifiers did not consider as many classes as COS and had problems distinguishing some types of land cover, due to either poor sample size or spectral signature similarity. Considering Matthews Correlation Coefficient (MCC), water class had the best performance with an average of 91,28%, followed by forest and agriculture class with an average of 47,88% and 42,34%, respectively, and lastly urban areas and bare land class had the worse results averaging 28,03% and 20,53% respectively. Nevertheless, the results obtained were still considered to be good, but with considerable room for improvement.Acompanhar as mudanças de ocupação de solo tem bastante utilidade para uma correta gestão de recursos, deteção de fogos florestais, e inúmeras aplicações. O tema de deteção remota é estudado há vários anos e tipicamente são usadas imagens multiespectrais obtidas através de satélites e aeronaves que são depois analisadas em detalhe. A entidade responsável por esta monitorização em Portugal é a Direção-Geral do Território (DGT) que produz a Carta de Uso e Ocupação do Solo (COS), onde identifica o uso e ocupação de solo de Portugal continental. Este documento tem uma resolução espacial muito boa mas a sua resolução temporal é muito baixa, pois só é produzido em alguns anos visto ser feito de forma manual. Isto é prejudicial ao acompanhamento em detalhe das mudanças na ocupação de solo visto muita informação não ser registada. Nesta dissertação desenvolveram-se vários classificadores, distribuídos de forma hierárquica, para mitigar este problema. Foram usadas árvores de decisão treinadas com imagens recolhidas pela constelação Sentinel-2. Apesar destas imagens terem uma resolução espacial mais fraca, os classificadores conseguem classificar o solo de maneira automática apenas em alguns minutos cada vez que um novo conjunto de imagens é recolhido, neste caso a cada 5 dias. Nem todas as imagens podem ser usadas, devido às condições atmosféricas, mas continua a ter uma resolução temporal superior à COS. No entanto, esta classificação automática não é tão exata quanto a manual. Também não foram consideradas tantas classes quanto as presentes na COS e os classificadores tiveram dificuldade em diferenciar algumas delas, seja pela amostra ser muito pequena ou pelos valores espetrais serem demasiado semelhantes. Considerando o Matthews Correlation Coefficient (MCC), a classe “water” obteve os melhores resultados com uma média de 91,28%, seguida pelas classes “forest” e “agriculture” com uma média de 47,88% e 42,34%, respetivamente, e por último as classes “urban areas” e “bare land” com uma média de 28,03% e 20,53% respetivamente. Mesmo assim considera-se que os resultados obtidos são satisfatórios, mas com muitas oportunidades de melhoria

Land degradation in Zimbabwe: a geographical study

A report on the causes of soil erosion in Zimbabwe. Report prepared on behalf of the Department of Natural Resources.This report covers five main aspects of the erosion survey of Zimbabwe. Firstly, the history of the erosion problem is examined with respect to the large and small scale commercial farming areas and the Communal Lands. This historical review is essential to understand how the present circumstances of soil conservation land degradation evolved. Secondly, the methods of the national survey are described and the relative advantages and disadvantages of these methods are discussed. There were no precedents for this survey in Africa or elsewhere and given that the study may well attract a great deal of attention and, perhaps, criticism, a full account of this pioneering methodology has been given

Assessment of land use change by quantifying landscape pattern in Welioya, Sri Lanka

Land use changes occur everywhere. Land use changes, such as forest degradation, effect on a global level. They have an influence for example to climate change, water circulation and erosion. However, they affect also on a local level and can have an impact to the everyday lives of local communities. Examining land use changes is important, because it brings more knowledge about changing areas, and how to deal with the changes. Local level examination is important when analysing land use changes, as local level actions help to understand large-scale phenomena as well. Understanding of land use changes can aid policymakers, who are responsible for making decisions about land use management. Land use changes are evident also in Sri Lanka. During the past few centuries, the country has undergone considerable forest loss. The loss of forest has affected to the land management of the country, since strict nature protection procedures have been put in place. In practise, this has meant strict forest conservation policies and forest demarcations in many areas. The strict forest protection has been a successful solution in terms of biodiversity conservation. At times the conservation procedures have been so restrictive that they have affected negatively to the life styles and livelihoods of local communities, who are dependent on the forest resources. This thesis examines the changes in land use in Welioya village, in central Sri Lanka. The village is located in the proximity of a demarcated Bogahapalassa Natural Forest, which has worked as a source of livelihoods for the villagers. This study examines, how the land use and land management has developed in the area. It views also, which kind of governmental actions have been implemented in the area to increase crop productivity. Moreover, it will consider the impacts of the strict conservation procedures to the local communities. It will also present alternative solutions that aim to include locals in the forest conservation. One of these procedures is called community participation. The land use changes are analysed with classifying satellite data by visual interpretation method. With the method, two land use maps are created for two different years, 2003 and 2015. After satellite image classification, the land use changes are quantified with landscape pattern analysis to discover, whether there is change in the landscape. Moreover, patchiness, fragmentation and other features of landscape pattern are assessed. Based on the results it is discovered that the area has gone through significant change. Due to the governmental projects, the area of home gardens has increased and traditional cultivation practises have decreased. The conservation of the Bogahapalassa Natural Forest has had a reviving effect, as the area of the forest has increased and open areas inside the forest have decreased. The government aims at protecting the forest in the future, but their focus is mostly in the biodiversity conservation, and not so much in the subsistence or livelihoods of the locals. This creates challenges in the area, and this remains a concern among the villagers.Maankäytön muutoksia tapahtuu ympäri maailmaa ja esimerkiksi metsien vähenemisellä on maailmalaajuisia vaikutuksia. Niillä on vaikutusta esimerkiksi ilmastonmuutokseen, veden kiertoon ja eroosioon. Maankäytön muutoksia tapahtuu myös paikallisella tasolla, ja niillä on vaikutusta paikallisten yhteisöjen jokapäiväiseen elämään. Maankäytön muutosten selvittäminen on tärkeää, sillä se tuo lisää tietoa muuttuvista alueista ja siitä, kuinka näiden muutosten kanssa tulee menetellä. Myös paikallisen tason tarkastelu on tärkeää tutkiessa maankäytön muutoksia, sillä paikallisen tason toimintatavat voivat auttaa ymmärtämään myös laajemman tason ilmiöitä. Lisäksi maankäytön muutosten ymmärtäminen voi auttaa päätöksentekijöitä, jotka ovat vastuussa maankäyttöä koskevista päätöksistä. Maankäytön muutokset ovat nähtävissä myös Sri Lankassa. Viimeisen muutaman vuosisadan aikana, Sri Lankan metsät ovat vähentyneet merkittävästi. Metsien häviäminen on vaikuttanut maankäyttöä koskevaan päätöksentekoon, sillä maassa on otettu käytäntöön tiukkoja luonnonsuojelutoimenpiteitä. Tämä on tarkoittanut monilla alueilla tiukkaa metsänsuojelupolitiikkaa ja metsissä liikkumisen rajoittamista. Tiukka metsien suojelu on ollut onnistunut ratkaisu biodiversiteetin suojelemisen kannalta. Toisinaan suojelutoimet ovat kuitenkin olleet niin rajoittavia, että ne ovat vaikuttaneet negatiivisesti elämäntyyleihin ja toimeentuloon paikallisten yhteisöjen keskuudessa, jotka ovat riippuvaisia metsistä saatavista resursseista. Tämä tutkielma tarkastelee maankäytön muutoksia Welioya-kylässä Sri Lankassa. Kylä sijaitsee rajatun Bogahapalassa -suojelumetsän läheisyydessä, joka on toiminut toimentulon lähteenä monelle paikalliselle. Tutkielmassa tarkastellaan, kuinka maankäyttö ja sen hallinta ovat kehittyneet alueella. Työssä tarkastellaan myös, millaisia valtiollisia toimenpiteitä alueella on toteutettu satojen tuottavuuden kasvattamiseksi. Lisäksi työssä käsitellään tiukkojen suojelutoimenpiteiden vaikutusta paikallisiin yhteisöihin. Työssä esitetään myös vaihtoehtoisia ratkaisuja, joilla pyritään siihen, että myös paikalliset yhteisöt osallistuisivat metsänsuojeluun (eng. community participation). Maankäytön muutoksia on analysoitu luokittelemalla satelliittikuvia visuaalisen tulkinnan avulla. Satelliittikuvien luokittelu on yleinen metodi maankäytön muutoksien tarkastelussa. Luokittelun avulla tutkimusalueelle luodaan kaksi maankäyttökarttaa vuosille 2003 ja 2015. Luokittelun jälkeen maankäytön muutokset kvantifioidaan maisema-analyysillä (landscape pattern analysis) muutoksien todentamiseksi. Maisemasta analysoidaan myös yhtenäisyyttä, fragmentoitumista ja muita maiseman piirteitä. Tulosten perusteella todetaan, että alue on muuttunut huomattavasti. Valtion rahoittamien projektien myötä kotipuutarhojen pinta-ala on kasvanut, ja perinteiset viljelymenetelmät ovat vähentyneet. Lisäksi Bogahapalassa metsän suojelulla on ollut elvyttävä vaikutus, sillä metsän pinta-ala on kasvanut, ja metsän rajojen sisällä sijaitsevien avomaiden osuus on vähentynyt. Sri Lankan hallitus pyrkii suojelemaan metsäaluetta myös tulevaisuudessa, mutta päätavoitteena on biodiversiteetin suojelu, eikä niinkään paikallisten ihmisten toimeentulon varmistaminen. Tämä aiheuttaa alueelle tulevaisuudessa haasteita, ja se on myös huolenaihe paikallisten kyläläisten keskuudessa

Natural Capital Asset Valuation of the Meewasin Northeast Swale for the Preservation of Saskatoon’s Natural Resources

The Meewasin Northeast Swale (Swale) is an ecologically significant site in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, featuring 310 ha of native grassland, woodland, and riparian wetland. Unimpacted grasslands and wetlands are endangered ecosystems with exceptional productivity, yet this unique channel scar is threatened by urban development. Threats from urban development include habitat fragmentation, alteration of hydrological conditions, increased chemical and physical contamination potential, propagation of exotic and invasive species, and noise and light pollution. Natural capital asset valuation (NCAV) is the process of determining the economic, environmental, and sociocultural value of a natural resource. The purpose of this thesis is to apply NCAV to the Swale to help inform environmental decision making and to develop suitable NCAV methodology for other natural resources in Saskatoon and other Canadian municipalities. Three valuation analyses were applied to the Swale: two benefit transfers and a hedonic regression. First, the Swale was delineated into its component ecosystems, showing that the Swale is predominantly wetland and grassland – 44% (138 ha) and 39% (122 ha) respectively – with the remaining components split between woodland, cropland, and manufactured features. The first benefit transfer used 36 ecosystem services from 20 studies to value four prioritised ecosystem services at $1.63 million per year. A follow-up to this benefit transfer used 186 values from 54 sources to value 17 ecosystem services at$7.36 million per year. Natural hazard mitigation was found to be the most valuable ecosystem service and wetland portions of the Swale are found to be the biggest contributor of value. Finally, a hedonic regression of the housing market surrounding the Swale indicated no statistically significant impacts from the Swale on nearby housing prices. However, despite the statistical insignificance, the model indicated that single-family detached homes within a 400 m walking distance of the Swale had an average increase to property value of $4,166; homes between a 400 and 800 m had an average decrease to property value of$5,689; and an unimpeded view of the Swale resulted in an average decrease of $636. Both methods considered in this thesis may be considered to be efficient methods for valuing Saskatoon’s natural capital. Benefit transfer is extremely efficient, despite its inherent uncertainty, while the hedonic pricing method is a strong site-specific method for valuing cultural ecosystem services, despite not providing significant results for the parameters of interest in this specific scenario. These analyses are not directly comparable, but their combined information allows for a greater understanding of the benefits provided by natural resources

The Global Drivers of Wildlife Tourism and its Future Potential in a Changing World

Nature tourism is tourism with the primary aim of experiencing and enjoying nature, often in PAs. Wildlife is a key attraction within the nature tourism industry, with many tourists visiting PAs to view and interact with free-roaming animals. This form of non-consumptive wildlife tourism can generate revenue for conservation, local communities, and national economic development. Accordingly, wildlife tourism has been heralded as a powerful tool that can help countries protect their biodiversity, while also growing and diversifying their economies, contributing to multiple international conservation and development goals simultaneously. In light of this, the lack of quantitative information on where tourists chose to go to watch wildlife, and why, has been identified as a major research gap. This study aims to determine the drivers of global wildlife tourism by identifying species’ traits and PA features that attract wildlife tourists, and to explore the potential of wildlife tourism in the future. I start by using phylogenetic comparative methods to predict the attractiveness of the world’s birds and terrestrial non-volant mammals. I define a species’ attractiveness based on the frequency with which species are cited by wildlife tourism resources (i.e., global and regional wildlife tourism guidebooks, brochures, websites) aimed predominantly at generalist, Western and/or English-speaking tourists, a large subset of the wildlife tourism market. In combination with data on species’ traits and range attributes, I model this index of attractiveness at a global scale. I repeat these analyses at a national scale, focussing on the United Kingdom, to explore whether the drivers of species attractiveness differ at these two scales. I go on to predict the popularity of PAs, based on the frequency of their occurrences within the same wildlife tourism literature mentioned above. To model this index of popularity, I consider predictor variables such as the attractiveness of the constituent species pool, as well as other PA features (such as size, remoteness, and land cover present at a site). I use ensemble species distribution models to assess the potential impact of future climate change on the ranges of the world’s birds and terrestrial mammals, taking into account uncertainty in climate models and species dispersal, and consider how this might influence global patterns of wildlife tourism. At the larger scale, species attractiveness was determined by a number of traits, including body mass, extinction risk, time partitioning (i.e., nocturnal vs. diurnal), and sociality/coloniality. Another important feature was the habitat in which a species occurs. The study also shows, for the first time, the significant impact of evolutionary distinctiveness, migratory behaviour in birds, and political stability (of the country in which a species is found) on species attractiveness. In the United Kingdom, attractiveness was influenced by a similar suite of traits, but slight variations indicated heterogeneous tourist preferences that differ between international globe-trotting tourists vs. mostly domestic tourists visiting the United Kingdom. The presence of attractive, as well as rarer, species assemblages was a key determinant enhancing PA popularity globally. PA popularity was also influenced by landscape features, age, size, accessibility and designation/management category. The observed connections between different components of biodiversity values supports the notion that managing PAs for both biodiversity and wildlife tourism simultaneously is possible. Strong relationships between PA popularity, as determined by citation frequency within wildlife tourism resources, and PA visitor numbers, suggest that wildlife tourism literature can serve as a proxy for human use of PAs. The results of my research indicate significant and untapped financial opportunities available to countries in sub-Saharan Africa, South America and South East Asia that protect, market, and develop their wildlife assets in the right way. PAs located in East and Southern Africa, the Peruvian Amazon, and Patagonia were predicted to be most popular. Despite possessing slightly less attractive species assemblages, PAs India, the Iberian Peninsula and the western portions of the United States were also popular. These PAs should be prioritised for wildlife tourism investment, as well as management efforts to maximise tourist interest but reduce the risk of over-visitation, in order to capitalise on wildlife tourism opportunities and the benefits they offer for biodiversity conservation and local people. In East Africa, the Amazon basin, and the Guianas, robust, proactive adaptation is needed to help managers mitigate projected climate-induced declines in species attractiveness. The tropical Andes, the Himalayas, and Russia’s Northern Taiga, may benefit from colonisation by attractive species as a result of climate change, but environmental impacts of increased visitation may need to be addressed

Nature is Pushing One Way and People are Pushing the Other : A Political Ecology of Forest Transitions in Western Montgomery County, PA

Forests in Southeastern Pennsylvania have been shaped by a number of anthropocentric factors over the past century, with many areas experiencing a recent trend towards forest recovery. Studies on forest dynamics have shown that most developed regions exhibit a forest transition, which begins when land is cleared for natural resource extraction (e.g., agriculture, forestry) during an early development stage. Then as a population grows and food production needs are met, rural peoples begin to migrate to the city, and a feeling of scarcity of trees develops that may lead to changes in land management attitudes, and many formerly deforested areas begin a process of forest recovery (Mather 1992, Rudel et al 2005). This process often occurs in conjunction with industrialization in nearby cities. Yet recent research also finds that many areas experience a different trajectory of forest change (Yeo and Huang 2013), or no noticeable transition (Acheson 2008). In such cases, questions arise about whether a forest management policy, rather than feelings of scarcity, promotes reforestation (Yeo and Huang 2013). In addition, the question of whether second home and amenity development - an increasing trend in residential development at the urban-rural fringe - is counteracting efforts to reforest in other areas arises (Acheson 2008). My research investigated the trajectory of forest change in a historically rural agricultural landscape as it has transitioned over time to an amenity-oriented exurban residential area. This study also explores how current residents of this landscape are altering the forest through their perspectives on land management and stewardship practices. My case study focuses on the historically rural Stone Hill Conservation Landscape, a largely agricultural productivist landscape in the mid-1900s, located just outside the Borough of Schwenksville in western Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. Drawing on grounded visualization approaches used in case studies of rural-to-urban transitions, I documented the interactions of exurbanites on forest transitions in the area. In order to better understand this migration and current stewardship practices in the area, I conducted semi structured interviews with eight residents living adjacent to one of the Conservation Landscape\u27s preserves. These interviews focused on the residents\u27 motivations for migrating, land management strategies regarding practices such as planting, cutting trees, removing weeds, and establishing lawn, and their views on development in Stone Hill. Their diverse perspectives placed them into three different categories; suburban idyll, pastoral/rural idyll, and nature/forest idyll. Then, using Google Earth aerial photo analysis, I documented the overall trend of reforestation in some of the study area while detailing reforestation and efforts by some exurbanites to minimize their impacts on forest loss. Results demonstrate that the attitudes and stewardship practices of exurban amenity migrants have a noticeable effect on the forest transition occurring in Stone Hill. It is important to understand this exurban forest transition because it contributes to the minimal existing literature on forest transitions in exurban landscapes of the Mid-Atlantic. Further it is important from a conservation perspective because these insights provide us with forest histories as well as a foreshadowing of possible clearing for further exurban development