Characteristics of seedling survival rate and analysis of its influencing factors in Tarim Desert Highway shelter-forest.

Second-year seedling survival rates of the Tarim Desert Highway shelter-forest project was investigated in detail with whole survey method,and the results show as follows:(1) seedling survival rate of Tarim Desert Highway shelter-forest project was lower than 70% because of bad afforestation environment.(2) Seedling survival rates among Haloxylon ammodendron,Chinese Tamarisk,Calligonum L.were different,Haloxylon ammodendron and Calligonum L.were basically more than that of Chinese Tamarisk,and seedling survival rates also differed under different irrigation water mineralizations,this difference increases with water mineralization enhancing,while this difference is little with small water mineralizations.(3) Three seedling survival rates decreases with irrigation water mineralization increase,but when the mineralization is lower than 10 g·L-1,this regularity is not obvious.(4) Seedling survival rates along the desert highway has some spatial variation laws,and seedling survival rates are all different,which depend on the shelter-forest transverse section's position,sand-dune densities,landform positions in longitudinal complex sand dune zones,and large landform units along the highway,This study would help with afforestation in extreme arid environment and research on sustainability of the Tarim Desert Highway shelter-forest.