Koim, Nora:
ISBN 9783899599558

Urban sprawl, land cover change and forest fragmentation Case study Pereira, Colombia. Berliner Ökophysiologische und Phytomedizinische Schriften Bd. 6 # ca. 130

The valley of the river Cauca in the Colombian Andes is characterized by severe transformation of natural ecosystems for human land use. The formerly contiguous forest cover has been reduced to isolated forest patches dispersed in a matrix of pastures and agricultural lands. Where the northern outlets of the Cauca meet the State of Risaralda, forests are exposed to considerable urban growth pressure by the adjacent state capital Pereira. With the aim of contributing to a sounder land management, a spatial analysis and a vegetation survey were conducted to provide baseline information about land change during the past years, the current status of forest fragmentation and the vegetation structure of forest stands. By supervised classification of two Landsat satellite images, land cover was compared between the years 1989 and 2002; furthermore, a forest map was generated from the 2002 satellite image and fragmentation metrics were calculated with Fragstats 3.3 software. Vegetation profiles of the largest forest fragments were produced, describing the vertical stand structure including height, coverage and dominant species of each vegetation layer. The spatial and structural-floristic attributes of the same fragments were then compared by means of an evaluation scheme in order to identify priority areas for conservation.

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