Impact of Wenchuan earthquake on the giant panda habitat in Wolong National Nature Reserve, China

Abstract Monitoring the change of the giant panda habitat is essential to protect this endangered species. The Wolong National Nature Reserve (WNNR) of China, the giant panda habitat, was struck by the Wenchuan earthquake ( M = 8.0 ) on May 12, 2008, and was seriously damaged. Landsat images covering the WNNR on four dates, one before and three after the earthquake, are classified using support vector machines to generate land cover maps (with an overall accuracy of ∼ 90 % and Kappa coefficients of ∼ 0.86 ). The habitat suitability index and weighted usable area (WUA) are calculated to evaluate the changes of the habitat suitability of the WNNR. The results indicate that the forest area dropped by ∼ 10 % due to the earthquake. The forest located in the east of Wolong town, the home of numerous giant pandas, suffered the most. The WUA decreased significantly after the earthquake, and was showing improvement in 2013, although still not fully recovered to the level of priori earthquake. The habitat between 1200 and 1300 m above sea level (m a.s.l.) was particularly vulnerable and was slowly recovering. Further effective management is necessary to restore and protect the giant panda habitat.

[1]  Guobin Zhu,et al.  Classification using ASTER data and SVM algorithms;: The case study of Beer Sheva, Israel , 2002 .

[2]  Chen Li.  EVALUATION ON GIANT PANDA HABITAT FRA GMENTATION IN WOLONG NATURE RESERVE , 1999 .

[3]  Yujun Yi,et al.  Impact of the Gezhouba and Three Gorges Dams on habitat suitability of carps in the Yangtze River , 2010 .

[4]  S. Kazama,et al.  Evaluations of seasonal habitat variations of freshwater fishes, fireflies, and frogs using a habitat suitability index model that includes river water temperature , 2011 .

[5]  Barnali M. Dixon,et al.  Multispectral landuse classification using neural networks and support vector machines: one or the other, or both? , 2008 .

[6]  Ningsheng Chen,et al.  Quantifying the spatial distribution of soil mass wasting processes after the 2008 earthquake in Wenchuan, China A case study of the Longmenshan area , 2010 .

[7]  B. Markham,et al.  Revised Landsat-5 TM radiometric calibration procedures and postcalibration dynamic ranges , 2003, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote. Sens..

[8]  Robert P. Brooks,et al.  Improving habitat suitability index models , 2016 .

[9]  Simon Haykin,et al.  Neural Networks and Learning Machines , 2010 .

[10]  Tiejun Wang.  Observing giant panda habitat and forage abundance from space , 2009 .

[11]  Weile Li,et al.  Analysis of the geo-hazards triggered by the 12 May 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake, China , 2009 .

[12]  Paul M. Mather,et al.  Support vector machines for classification in remote sensing , 2005 .

[13]  Xiaoqing Chen,et al.  The Wenchuan Earthquake (May 12, 2008), Sichuan Province, China, and resulting geohazards , 2011 .

[14]  Wang Xue,et al.  Impacts of Wenchuan Earthquake on giant panda habitat in Dujiangyan region , 2008 .

[15]  L. S. Davis,et al.  An assessment of support vector machines for land cover classi(cid:142) cation , 2002 .

[16]  Dong Zhang,et al.  Analyzing coastal wetland change in the Yancheng National Nature Reserve, China , 2011 .

[17]  Chih-Jen Lin,et al.  LIBSVM: A library for support vector machines , 2011, TIST.

[18]  Liu Ping-xiang.  An Improved Topographic Correction Approach for Satellite Image , 2005 .

[19]  G. Niemi.  Wildlife-Habitat Relationships: Concepts and Applications, 3rd ed , 2010 .

[20]  Shen Guo.  INFLUENCE OF THE WENCHUAN EARTHQUAKE ON GIANT PANDA HABITATS AND STRATEGIES FOR RESTORATION , 2008 .

[21]  Michael Matthies,et al.  A FUZZY HABITAT SUITABILITY INDEX FOR POPULUS EUPHRATICA IN THE NORTHERN AMUDARYA DELTA (UZBEKISTAN) , 2005 .

[22]  Ouyang Zhi,et al.  Impact assessment of Wenchuan Earthquake on ecosystems , 2008 .

[23]  Michael A. Wulder,et al.  Landsat continuity: Issues and opportunities for land cover monitoring , 2008 .

[24]  B. Fu,et al.  Sustainability Evaluation of the Grain for Green Project: From Local People’s Responses to Ecological Effectiveness in Wolong Nature Reserve , 2007, Environmental management.

[25]  Taskin Kavzoglu,et al.  A kernel functions analysis for support vector machines for land cover classification , 2009, Int. J. Appl. Earth Obs. Geoinformation.

[26]  Vincenzo Naddeo,et al.  Ecological status of rivers in preserved areas: Effects of meteorological parameters , 2013 .

[27]  Shirong Liu,et al.  Habitat evaluation of wild Amur tiger (Panthera tigris altaica) and conservation priority setting in north-eastern China. , 2011, Journal of environmental management.

[28]  William B. Ouimet,et al.  Landslides associated with the May 12, 2008 Wenchuan earthquake: Implications for the erosion and tectonic evolution of the Longmen Shan , 2010 .

[29]  Patrick Hostert,et al.  Land cover mapping of large areas using chain classification of neighboring Landsat satellite images , 2009 .

[30]  Huabin Wang,et al.  Preliminary investigation of some large landslides triggered by the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake, Sichuan Province, China , 2009 .

[31]  Klaus I. Itten,et al.  Geometric and radiometric correction of TM data of mountainous forested areas , 1993, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote. Sens..

[32]  Sokjin Hong,et al.  GIS-based suitable site selection using habitat suitability index for oyster farms in Geoje-Hansan Bay, Korea , 2012 .

[33]  Hassiba Nemmour,et al.  Multiple support vector machines for land cover change detection: An application for mapping urban extensions , 2006 .

[34]  Jianguo Liu,et al.  An assessment of giant panda habitat in Wolong Nature Reserve , 2001 .

[35]  Xuezhi Wang,et al.  Impact of China's May 12 earthquake on Giant Panda habitat in Wenchuan County , 2009 .

[36]  Corinna Cortes,et al.  Support-Vector Networks , 1995, Machine Learning.

[37]  Russell G. Congalton,et al.  A review of assessing the accuracy of classifications of remotely sensed data , 1991 .

[38]  Vladimir N. Vapnik,et al.  The Nature of Statistical Learning Theory , 2000, Statistics for Engineering and Information Science.

[39]  C. S. Jha,et al.  Forest fragmentation and its impact on species diversity: an analysis using remote sensing and GIS , 2005, Biodiversity & Conservation.

[40]  W. Cohen,et al.  Landsat's Role in Ecological Applications of Remote Sensing , 2004 .

[41]  Lihong Su,et al.  Optimizing support vector machine learning for semi-arid vegetation mapping by using clustering analysis , 2009 .

[42]  B. Fu,et al.  Entangling the Complexity of Protected Area Management: The Case of Wolong Biosphere Reserve, Southwestern China , 2004, Environmental management.

[43]  Hailong Li,et al.  Application of least-cost path model to identify a giant panda dispersal corridor network after the Wenchuan earthquake - case study of Wolong Nature Reserve in China. , 2010 .