Distribution Pattern Of Plant Diversity And Vegetation Construction In Field Margins And Homegardens

Agricultural landscape and rural settlements depend on hotspots of biodiversity and ecosystem services that are found in field margins and homegardens.Indeed, these habitats can be managed and designed to host local biodiversity, with neutral positive effects on ecosystem services and human well-being. Based on fieldwork, interviews, variation in species richness, function composition and habitat specificity among field margins, infield islets and homegarden was explored, in combination with variable, including habitat variability, landscape variable, management and households’contextual attributes.In order to strengthen agricultural and rural eco-environments management, maximize ecosystem service, then we briefly outline the principal approaches and measures for vegetation construction and management within agricultural-rural ecosystem.1In this study the plant species diversity, composition and abundance is examined at the scale of site, habitat and landscape for14farm habitats in the North China Plain by stratified random sampling. The result show that (1) at the site level, river vegetation had the highest richness of overall, followed by ditch. Orchards, cereals, vegetable, orchard had few species and native richness (<70%), especially for vegetable field only35.5%.(2) At the site level, Sacred graves as infield islet (9-800m2) had the highest species richness in total (102), herbs (85) and spontaneous native unique species in one specific habitat(6). Woodlots had the most woody species (56). Other habitats had spontaneous unique native species also.(3) For all habitats,161species belonging to119genera and41families were recorded.The spontaneous species recorded represented81species, whereas herbaceous represented131,58%of which were native,74%were weeds, and22.1%were noxious weeds. In this survey,3wild endangered species and15potentially invasive species were recorded. Cotton fields, field road (≥4m) and river (pond) have the most frequent of it. Site scale has lower percent of native species and higher proportion of weeds than habitat scales. The cluster and DCA analysis for herbs showed that sacred grave with nearly natural features and grass were different, as were cotton fields, cereals, vegetable, orchard and noncrop habitats.(4) Landscape level study revealed that species composition and diversity varied significantly among the five landscape scenarios, which from a monotonous agricultural landscape to a diverse mosaic of crop and non-crop composite landscape. When all agricultural production habitats appeared, growth of alien species richness and noxious weeds became to flatten, and perennial weeds, woody, particularly native species became to increased steeply for joining non-agricultural habitats.2The vegetation compositions of506individual field margins were inventoried systematically. The results of this study are as follows:(1) a total of123species were recorded in this investigation. The dominant families are prominent. The single species genera are rich.(2) The spontaneous vegetation is dominant by grasses, herbs and shrub. Planting trees are dominant by single-species. Despite having many widespread species, vegetation structure, species richness, function composition and species cover differed between the five field margin types.(3) The rivers&ditches have the highest a diversity and the herbaceous field ridges have the lowest one. The roads (width>4m) have the highest (β-diversity and y-diversity. And the field roads (width<4m) have the lowest ones.(4) Community similarity analysis shows that the field roads (width<4m) and the herbaceous field ridges have highest inter-community similarity, while field roads (width<4m) and the wooded field ridges have lowest one.3The result of field margins showed that (1) the plant species richness and composition of field margins were affected significantly by most explanatory variables including local and the landscape factor. Multivariate analysis showed that (2) besides adjacent land use, structure, abiotic environmental conditions, the role of other factors such as landscape factors and management could not be neglected.(3) The type of field margin had a special impact on vegetation compositions—riverside&ditches and woody field ridge enhanced the richness of nature-value species, woody species, perennial herbaceous and suppressed agrotolerant species, annual&biennial species; boundaries with tree or shrub layer hosted only a few agrotolerant, annual and biennial species. Wider road verges increased the species richness of both plant functional groups while narrow road verges hosted more agrotolerant, annual and biennial species.(4) PCCA methods revealed the ranking of the5subsets. Besides a predominant impact of land use, structure, abiotic environmental, it was found that landscape context have a relatively larger influence on the distribution of plant species in field margins than management.4This study analyzed the distribution of plant species richness and the impact of site history and islet area on plant diversity in small remnant habitats midfield islets in101×1km2agricultural landscapes grid cells in Quzhou, Hebei Province. Five habitats included different types of vegetation: deciduous tree, shrub, mixed herbaceous and herbaceous layers. The result showed that (1) there were494midfield islets in the study agriculture landscape and103species were found on200investigated midfield islets. The mean area of the islets was68.3m2. Although they occupied a relatively small area (3.38ha) the majority (64%) of total species in the study agriculture landscape were found in the islets.(2) From the characteristics of the plant species traits, the native was the leading one. Different types of vegetation have habitat specialists which species restricted to only one habitat. In this survey,3wild endangered species were recorded.(3) Alpha diversity was highest in type1and β diversity was highest in type4and type5habitats. γ diversity was highest in type2and lowest in type5.(4) Line regression shows that diversity is positively related to area and age of midfield indicating a strong history and area effect. Area and history are also shown to have an independent effect on tree and shrub covers. Our study suggests that maintaining non-crop habitats such as midfield islets is critical for sustaining and restoring biodiversity in intensive agricultural landscape.(5)Then the hypothesis that plant diversity in infield islets can be influenced by a range of variables including local and the landscape factor was tested. The explained variation in species richness was significant for15of the28variables. For the fraction of variable explained, STR and LDS are all more than SIT.5The gardens were distributed across three urbanized regions (suburban, peri-urban, and exurban). We found that species biodiversity and abundance shift according to a hierarchy of need. Garden biodiversity and abundance shifted from ornamentals (cultural ES) to edibles (provisioning ES) with distance from Beijing. Rarefaction curves indicate ornamental species drive (3diversity. Ordination also showed a shift in species composition across a distance gradient from the city; Suburban and exurban gardens were the most different, while peri-urban gardens were similar to both. High edible cover and high species density indicates that demand for edibles in exurban may be higher than suburban.6We present the detailed analysis of variation in vegetation structure and land-use of home gardens, in relation to garden area and urbanization, across five villages in Beijing. In all105homegardens studied,43.8%with smaller parcel area have a border garden. The average garden size including inside and outside for gardening is189.2m2(37-746m2).The land-use richness per garden ranged from3to14across all five villages with an overall mean of8.9.Garden size and urbanization gradient had significant influence on garden configuration. Larger size supported more land-use richness. The land-use richness of suburban was significantly lower. Some features have a relatively fixed distribution. The area of various vegetation layers and the number of trees>3m in height in gardens increased significantly with garden area. The effect of urbanization gradient on vertical vegetation area and the proportional contribution of garden were also significant. For the cover of vegetation layers of<3m, the exurban is the largest. But for>3m, peri-urban is the largest. 7This research investigated whether garden biophysical variables, management and households’ characteristics have a quantitative and predictable relationship with homegardens vegetation composition, plant diversity and garden type using multiple regression methods. The result reveal that:(1) garden size and family income, land-use within gardens and vertical vegetation structure significantly affected plant diversity of homegarden. At same time, with the increase of agricultural in the proportion of family income, the age of household head, old persons, and the decrease of education years of household head, the edible species richness is higher. The age of household head and education were associated with the native plant richness. Garden history and gender of garden labor were associated with shelter and wood species. And female household head promoted overall species richness, ornamental and herbaceous species richness.(2) Female household head had the strongest relationship with ornamental garden.Garden size and family income were strong predictors for the woody garden. Distance to urban, major source of family income, garden structure, and labor invested for homegardening have a predictable relationship with paving over garden. Distance to urban, major source of family income, agricultural in the proportion of family income, garden structure, labor invested, garden history and gender of labor for gardening were strong predictors of edible homegarden. Garden structure, labor invested, garden history, and gender of labor for gardening was strong predictors of multifunction homegarden.8Good vegetation stewardship on the agricultural landscape is all about choosing the right measures, putting them in the right habitats, and managing them in the right way. We briefly outline the principal approaches and measures for vegetation construction and management within agricultural-rural ecosystem based on our research and previous experience. These suggestions is intended to help anyone undertaking subdivision in the rural environment achieve good practice and design.