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| Restoration of plant species diversity on valley slope sand dunes and the influencing factors in Tibet, China |
| Received:December 14, 2016 |
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| KeyWord:alpine sandy land;vegetation recovery;plant diversity;topographic influence;Tibetan plateau |
| Author Name | Affiliation | E-mail | | LI Hai-dong | Nanjing Institute of Environmental Sciences, Ministry of Environmental Protection, Nanjing 210042, China | | | LIN Nai-feng | Nanjing Institute of Environmental Sciences, Ministry of Environmental Protection, Nanjing 210042, China | | | LIAO Cheng-rui | Nanjing Institute of Environmental Sciences, Ministry of Environmental Protection, Nanjing 210042, China | | | FANG Ying | Nanjing Institute of Environmental Sciences, Ministry of Environmental Protection, Nanjing 210042, China | fangying@nies.org |
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| Abstract: |
| Desertification has been described as one of the most critically important global problems. By 2014, the sandification area of Tibet Autonomous Region, China was 21.58×104 km2, and caused immense damages to regional ecological security and local socioeconomic development. In this paper, the plant species composition and vegetation recovery situation were investigated on sand dunes in the alpine valley slope of the middle reaches of Yarlung Zangbo River of Tibet, China, based on field surveys of four belt transects and 160 quadrats established on two types of interdune and windward sides of sand dunes, respectively. Firstly, the changes in species richness, α diversity, and β diversity were analyzed, and then the influences of elevation, slope, and vegetation coverage on species diversity were explored. The purpose of this study was to provide a practical basis for vegetation and biodiversity restoration on sand dunes in the Tibetan Plateau. The results showed that there were 14 species in the 160 quadrats of vegetation recovery of valley slope sand dunes in 2011, belonging to 12 genera in nine families. In terms of α diversity, the change in the Shannon-Wiener index between the four belt transects was relatively large, while the changes in the Simpson index and Pielou evenness index were small. Generally speaking, the α diversity index presented a similar increasing trend with that of species richness. In terms of β diversity, the community similarity of interdunes was greater than that of windward dunes, and from the viewpoint of community gradient, the result of species diversity restoration on interdunes was also better than that of windward dunes. The filed survey in 2016 showed that the average vegetation coverage had reached 65.6%, with the highest 94%. The main factors that influenced the restoration of species diversity were microtopography on valley slope sand dunes and screening for suitable plant species. To improve the species diversity of vegetation restoration, several measures could be used, such as setting a sand barrier to alter the microtopography, using an approach which sows seeds into footprints trampled on sand dunes by feet following the contours of the mountain, or increasing the number of plant species. |
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