High-Mountain Landscape Classification to Analyze Patterns of Land Use and Potential Natural Vegetation

Abstract

In Georgia’s Lesser Caucasus, extremely species rich wooded grasslands are still used as pastures or meadows. These silvopastoral systems are one of the oldest land-use types in Europe, hosting both light-demanding and shade-tolerant species. However, in Europe silvopastoral systems have decreased over the past centuries. The aim of this study is to map, quantify, and classify the local land use and forest types in comparison to the potential natural vegetation to analyze and evaluate the high-mountain landscape pattern. Therefore, we mapped a 223 km2 study area and classified this mountainous terrain by topographical variables in a cluster analysis. Our results revealed a small-scale pattern of agriculture and forest in the study area, both strongly interlinked. The forest pattern strongly depends on altitude and aspect. The mentioned wooded grassland consists of forests with varying canopy covers connecting the settlement-near pastures and meadows in the montane belt with the natural open grassland in the alpine belts. The forest is in a near-natural condition compared with the potential natural vegetation. However, the quantifications revealed shrub encroachment indicating land-use abandonment. The compiled GIS-maps and the spatial classification of the landscape can be used to support sustainable management strategies in forestry and agriculture.

Climate Interprets Saturation Value Variations Better Than Soil and Topography in Estimating Oak Forest Aboveground Biomass Using Landsat 8 OLI Imagery

“…Additionally, the topography is also one of the main factors affecting the distribution of vegetation types and forest AGB [34]. For instance, slope, aspect, and altitude are all influential factors affecting the distribution of vegetation types, as shady slopes receive less sunlight, resulting in cooler and moister conditions, while sunny slopes tend to be warmer and drier [35]. Altitude is a crucial variable since it affects temperature, precipitation, and atmospheric pressure, which results in differences in species distribution [36].…”