Habitat Analysis For The Gray Snub-nosed Monkey In Guizhou Fanjingshan National Nature Reserve

Gray Snub-nosed Monkey (Rhinopithecus brelichi), as a rare, endangered and endemic species to China, once distributed in more than 10 provinces around Guizhou province, but now this specie is living only around the Fanjingshan with small population size.. Based on Spot 5 satellite image obtained in June 2004 and field investigations, the vegetation of Fanjingshan Nature Reserve was analyzed through processing and correcting the images by using the ERDAS image processing software. 10 types of vegetation were identified,including the typical evergreen broad-leaved forest,the montane deciduous broad-leaved forest , the montane humid evergreen and deciduous broad-leaved forest , the montane cool temperate mixed needle broad-leaved forest,, the montane elfin forest, the Warm evergreen needle forest, the temperate evergreen needle forest, the Warm bamboo forest, the temperate bamboo thicket and the montane thicket. The spatial distribution and other relevant information of each vegetation type were obtained by using ArcGIS. The occurrence frequency of Gray Snub-nosed Monkey in each vegetation type indicated that the typical evergreen broad-leaved forest, the montane humid evergreen and deciduous broad-leaved forest and the montane elfin forest were the main vegetations selected by the monkeys, accounting for 80.72% of the total area.The principal component analysis of 205 sample sites used by Gray Snub-nosed Monkey indicated that the cumulative contribution of the first 5 principal components reached to 83.2%, and these factors could represent the main information of 10 factors. The results show that Gray Snub-nosed Monkey prefer to use habitat on sharp east and north slopes with tall and thick trees, high canopy, low tree density, tall shrub, high shrub density and cover..The Gray Snub-nosed Monkey's habitat database including slope, aspect, elevation, vegetation and human activities was built by using GIS software. Landscape connectivity, as a parameter measuring ecological processes by which the subpopulations of a landscape are interconnected into a demographic functional unit, was employed in this study to evaluate the habitat suitability for Gray Snub-nosed Monkey in Fanjingshan Nature Reserve. It was carried out by using landscape ecological model and GIS. It is found that, with no human activities being considered, 99.53 km~2 (22.96%) of the total area is suitable for Gray Snub-nosed Monkey to live, while unsuitable area is 229 km~2 (52.73%). However, with human activities being considered, the most suitable area decreased by 10.58%, the moderately suitable area decreased by 15.04%, the marginally suitable area decreased by 17.71%, and the unsuitable area increased by 13.91%. It showed that roads and settlements had big influence on the habitat of the Gray Snub-nosed Monkey.The analysis of threats to the Gray Snub-nosed Monkey showed that the road construction, tourism development, firewood cutting, illegal acquisition, forest fire etc. are the main threats to the Monkey's survival. The nature reserve manager should thus take some effective ways to cut down or eliminate the threat factors, for example, strengthening the patrolling and long-term monitoring in the protected area, and improving the Gray Snub-nosed Monkey's habitat quality. At the same time, in order to increase the ability to respond to disasters, additional populations of the monkeys could be established in those places where the Gray Snub-nosed Monkey once distributed in history and there is still suitable habitat for the monkeys.