Habitat Analysis For Yunnan Snub-nosed Monkey (Rhinopithecus Bieti) Based On 3S Technologies

Yunnan Snub-nosed Monkey (Rhinopithecus bieti), with a population of estimated 1500~2000 individuals, is one of the most endangered species endemic to China. The species distributes in a narrow geographical area, which is bounded between two great rivers (Yangtze and Lancang) in east and west, and ranges from Mangkang in Tibet to Longmashan in Yunlong County, Dali. Since the 1970s, scientists have carried out researches on the monkey's geographical distribution and population, taxonomy, anatomy and molecular evolution, etc. However, research on habitat analysis is still lacking, the main problem facing is that it is very hard to track the monkey continuously due to the difficult terrain condition.3S technologies (GIS-Geography Information System, RS-Remote Sensing, GPS-Global Positioning System) are used integratedly in this paper to do the habitat analysis for the monkey. Based on the international convention on conservation planning, the research is conducted in two different spatial scales, namely ecoregional scale and conservation area scale. This study is expected to get new knowledge on the monkey's ecology and habitat utilization pattern, and demonstrate a high-tech based model for the wildlife habitat analysis.In the ecoregional scale, based on the ecological knowledge of the monkey's habitat utilization, a spatial model is created to analyze the potential suitable habitat in yunnan for this species. We first summarize the ecological knowledge about the monkey's habitat utilization based on the existing studies. Then RS and GIS technologies are used to collect and process all needed information, and create the spatial model to extract the monkey's potential suitable habitat distribution map, which consists with the expert's data drawn by hands very well. The result shows that, currently, the total area of the monkey's potential suitable habitat is 6069.095 km2, which is split into 10 separate patches. However, the existing monkey groups only occur among 6 patches, the total area for these 6 patches is 5272.437 km2. This method usually is the efficient way to get background information for conservation planning in large scales, especially under the situation when we don't have enough resources to do detailed field survey and recreate all the needed information.In the conservation area scale, the study focuses on a group of monkey located in Jinsichang, and does analysis from different aspects like vegetation pattern, home range,...