The Habitat Degradation And Recovery Technology Of The Golden Snub-nosed Monkey In Shennongjia Nature Reserve

The Golden Snub-nosed Monkey is one kind of the first class national protected animals and also an endangered species. With the development of protection, the population and distribution range of Golden Snub-nosed Monkeys have been obtained.However, the severer degeneration of its habitat is still a serious threat to the survival of the Golden Snub-nosed Monkey. Thus, it has become particularly important to research the characteristics, scope and mechanism of degradation, and to analyze the restoration mode and technology. This paper shows the results of the investigation into the Golden Snub-nosed Monkey’s suitable habitat and degenerative habitat in Shennongjia(including mild degenerated habitat and seriously degraded habitat). Meanwhile, through the comparison of vegetation type, species composition and quantitative characteristic, the characteristics of the degraded habitat and habitat degradation mechanism have been found. The results of studying the model, material and technology of habitat restoration are also included in this paper. The main results of this study are as follows:1. It has been found that the Golden Snub-nosed Monkey ’s degraded habitat is mainly distributed in Dalongtan, Xiaolongtan, Jinhou Ridge, Xiaoqianjia Village, Yinyu River and Wenshui Forest after the interview to local technicians and site investigation.The light degraded habitat is mainly distributed in Jinhou Ridge and Xiaolongtan while other scattered parts are located in Dalongtan and Xiaoqianjia Village; the serious degraded habitat is mainly distributed in Dalongtan and Yinyu River while other scattered parts are located in Jinhou Ridge, Xiaoqianjia Village and Wenshui Forest, also including the alpine meadow and the shrub in Golden Snub-nosed Monkeys’ territory.2. Mixed broadleaf-conifer forests and coniferous forests of Golden Snub-nosed Monkeys’ habitat are seriously degraded while broad-leaf forests are lightly degraded.Shrubs, especially shrubs food distribution is less, what is more, the arbor ’s canopy density and diameter at breast height, as well as the shrub’s cover degree of degraded habitat are smaller than suitable habitat’s(P<0.01), and the more serious the degree ofdegradation is, the smaller the habitat factor is.3. The degradation mechanism of Golden Snub-nosed Monkeys’ habitat mainly includes the following four aspects:(1) Forest diseases and insect pests. There is 76.92%of the degraded habitat, which is distributed majorly on the positive(65.38%) and the upper slope(80.77%) at altitude between 2000-2600 m, suffering from forest diseases and insect pests(beetle pest of Pinus armandii);(2) Deforestation. There is 77.42% of the degraded habitat suffering from deforestation while there isn ’ t any deforestation in suitable habitat.(3) Excessive use of Golden Snub-nosed Monkeys(4) Human disturbance. For example, some villagers gather herbs and lacquer trees in the area with smaller gradient(19.72°) that is mainly in the downhill and less than 500 m apart from the roads, in addition, tourists increase, roads segmentation and construction of large venues have also caused the phenomenon that Golden Snub-nosed Monkeys are abandoning their habitat.4. Two kinds of habitat restoration mode are put forward according to the degree of the Golden Snub-nosed Monkey’ s habitat degradation: repair and reconstruction. We can get 8 kinds of habitat templates by systematically classifying the suitable habitat communities. Repair technology of mild degraded habitat and Reconstruction technology of severe degraded habitat are put forward combined habitat restoration mode. Repair technology includes diseased wood cutting, woodland clearing, trees and shrubs planting,reconstruction technology includes woodland clearing, land preparation, afforestation.