Construction Of Ecological Corridor For Presbytis Leucocephalus In Chongzuo,Guangxi

The landscape fragmentation will result in the fragmentation of landscape patches.The habitats for wild animal will be forced to separate into islands and wild animals will be split into several small populations,which is extremely terrible for the survival of wild animals.The consequence of fragmentation is that the habitats of wild animals are divided into islands little by little,and some habitats which are not suitable for the survival of species may be distributed on the edges of the fragmented habitats.The normal diffusion,movement,community building and other behaviors of the species can not be done.This will cause the decrease in the number and increase in the mortality of the species.The ecological network can connect the fragmented habitats by ecological corridors and restore the connection between the habitats,which can effectively reduce the impact of landscape fragmentation on the survival of wild animals and restore the regional biological diversity at the same time.Therefore,the construction of ecological networks is regarded as an effective approach for the protection of wild animals,and also a method commonly used in international wild animal conservation.Chongzuo City in Guangxi Province is one of the main distribution areas of Presbytis leucocephalus.At present,three high-grade roads in the Chongzuo City of Guangxi divide the habitat of Presbytis leucocephalus in the area into three habitats in Longfeng mountainous,Nongguan mountain and Nongdeng mountain.Now the three habitats are isolated from each other,and the restoration of the connection between the three habitats has become the key to the success of Presbytis leucocephalus conservation in the area.Based on the ecological habits and behaviors of Presbytis leucocephalus,and using the land-use type in the 2016 study area as the landscape surface model,this study divided the land-use type and set the resistance values by field observation and data collection,selected 12 karst rocky mountains in the area as the step-stones for the ecological corridors,and analyzed the ecological networks among the three habitats in Longfeng mountain,Nongguan mountain,and Nongdeng mountain by adopting the minimum resistance path analysis as a technical route.The study results delimited a total of 20 ecological corridors connecting the three habitats and the step-stones,forming a complete ecological network of the three habitats,which included six ecological corridors connecting the habitats and the step-stones,and 14 ecological corridors connecting the step-stones.The main land-use types within these ecological corridors are farmland(sugarcane fields and corn fields),artificial eucalyptus forests,and karst rocky mountains,including four ecological corridors that pass through high-grade roads and secondary roads.Finally,this study discussed the important issues of the construction of ecological corridors such as the long-term protection of the 17 step-stones,the construction node of ecological corridors and high-grade road junctions,and the width of the corridors.It also further proposed suggestions on the ecological compensation for neighboring villagers during the construction of the corridors as well as the issues concerning the follow-up protection of Presbytis leucocephalus and their habitats and other ecological network construction in the later period.The innovations of this study were:(1)To analyze the specific spatial location of ecological corridors by using ArcGIS software;(2)To determine the step-stones of the ecological corridors through observing the fecal traces of Presbytis leucocephalus on the rocky mountains and rocky cliffs and based on the ecological characteristics and behavioral characteristics of Presbytis leucocephalus;(3)Three coping ways,namely ecological bridges above the road,the ecological culverts under the road and canopy bridges were proposed when the ecological corridors needed to cross the high-grade roads to realize the connection.