| Forest Musk Deer is one of the smallest deer, belonging to Mammalia, Artiodactyla, Moschidae, Moschus. It is listed in the First Category of the List of State Key Protected Wild Life. In IUCN and "China's Red Book of endangered species," it is classified as endangered or vulnerable species. Forest Musk Deer has been widely distributed in more than 20 provinces, but the distribution area have been substantially reduced, and now only concentrated in Gansu, Shaanxi, Sichuan, Tibet, and other provinces.Habitat fragmentation is main reason of population decline for many species. From 2004 to 2007, including the author, researchers of my laboratory went to Shanxi Fengxian which located in West part of Qinling Mountain, and done the field survey for local Forest Musk Deer distribution, population size, habitat quality and other factors. Based on 3S technique, habitat fragmentation of Forest Musk Deer had been studied on the large-scale (Fengxian County), and comprehensively learned the fragmental habitat's landscape pattern and the situation for the Forest Musk Deer. The goals of my research were to analysis the local Forest Musk Deer's habitat quality and fragmentations, estimate the influence of human activities for its habitat, learn the landscape pattern, and provide scientific support for Forest Musk Deer's conservation and management. Fengxian Country had been covered by this research. The main findings are as follows:1, Some papers told us that, in the large-scale, the most important factors for habitat selection of Forest Musk Deer is the altitude, slop degree, vegetation type and human activities. Based on years of survey data, we found that the best habitat of Forest Musk Deer in Fengxian is the high-altitude which range is 1700～2200 m in the, high; slope which range is 30～50 degrees; and the virgin forest conserved perfectly. In Fengxian, this forest is generally broadleaf forest which is far from human activities.2, Based on GIS, we do the landscape classification on the satellite images according to field survey reference sites, and divided it into "broadleaf forest", "conifer forest", "the broadleaf and conifer forest" and "grassland, nude and the other" four kinds of landscape types. Furthermore, we got the topographic maps from Internet. So the elevation, slope of Fengxian has been get from it. Finally, we get Fengxian's road and resident map via map digitizing.3, After comprehensively analysing, the result showed that: The most appropriate habitat for Forest Musk Deer was only 100.48 km~2, 3.46% of all area of Fengxian. Furthermore, its distribution was so scattered, that it is hard to be used by Forest Musk Deer. Secondly, suitable habitat was 833.06 km~2, 26.14% of all area of Fengxian. This habitat could be used by Forest Musk Deer. However, because of the drive of economic benefits, more and more Mountain areas were involved in mining, herborization, and so on, so the survival of Forest Musk Deer had been threatened heavily by these activities.4, For the landscape index, the characters of the most suitable habitat of Forest Musk Deer were as follows: the smallest total area, more patch number, the smallest average patch area, scattered, isolated, cracked. Besides, it was more regular compared to habitat of other grade because of small area.5, Compared to potential habitat of Forest Musk Deer, because of the influence of human, the most suitable habitat and the secondly suitable habitat decreased by 46.76% and 28.95%, respectively; the number of all grade of habitat decreased, the average area of allgrade of habitat increased, but the "unsuitable habitat" increased shapelier than others. MPI of the most suitable habitat decreased by up to the extent of 120%, so it was more scattered than others. The AWMPED showed that the shape of unsuitable habitat and secondly suitable habitat tend to simple, but the others tend to complex.6, According to result of research, we must adopt some measures to recover Forest Musk Deer's population. At the ecological aspects, we should establish some habitat corridors to increase habitat connectivity and exchange of gene, and improve the habitat quality evidently. Then set up natural reserve area in better habitat to accelerate population growth of the Forest Musk Deer. Otherwise, some administrative measures should be enforced timely: 1) enhanced the wildlife law and regulations' enforcement and increased the public awareness; 2) stopped the fragmental trend of habitat, reduced human influence; 3) established Community Condominium Regime, Changing the traditional income recourses and developing sustainable economic. |
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