Landscape Pattern of Giant Panda Habitat in the Liangshan Mountains, Sichuan, China

Landscape pattern of habitat affects the structure and distribution of wildlife populations to a great extent. Supported by the ‘3S’ technology and FRAGSTATS software, the characteristics of the landscape pattern of the giant panda habitat in the Liangshan Mountains, Sichuan, China were studied using fi eld survey data and ETM images. The results show that the habitat area of the giant panda there was used to be 356 798 hm2, occupying 29% of the study area. Due to human activities, the current area of the habitat suitable for giant panda is only 177 157 hm2, accounting for 49.65% of the total habitat area. One of giant panda’s main habitats is the temperate coniferous and broad-leaf mixed forest that covers the largest area in the region and where there are the highest connection between one patch and another. It possesses the largest average patch area of 75.67 hm2 among 14 landscape types and becomes the landscape base of the giant panda habitat. Comparatively, the temperate deciduous broad-leaved bush and bamboo forest are very fragmented as their PRAC_MN are 1.02 and 1.03, respectively. Although the landscape diversity is rich and different types of landscapes are discrete at distance, and their shapes are regular, the whole landscape tends to be integrity and is not very fragmented. But if the human activities, such as road construction, logging, bamboo collection and grazing, could not be controlled in the region, the giant panda habitat would be separated into fi ve pieces, which would threaten the survival of giant panda there. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary and urgent to strengthen the management and protection of the giant panda habitat in this region. Fig 3, Tab 7, Ref 18