Monitoring landscape dynamics and conditions of natural resources within and adjacent to protected areas

Abstract

The challenges of managing natural resources of protected areas not only come from the inside of the protected boundaries, but also from the surrounding territories because most of protected lands are open systems that face threats from adjacent areas. The lands of such open systems alter water quality and flow regimes, increase the likelihood of invasive plant and animal range expansions, reduce contiguous forest, and affect the integrity of the protected ecosystems. This paper addresses general issues of the role of remote sensing data in monitoring and reporting ecological integrity of protected lands. We examined two case studies in the Northeast Temperate Network of the National Park Service's Inventory and Monitoring Program of the United States and the Changbai Mountain Natural Reserve of the Northeast China. Knowledge of historical trends, not only how much has changed but also where and when changes have occurred, can help land managers identify key resources and ecosystem stressors, as well as prioritize resource management efforts in monitoring vital signs as the indicators of ecosystem conditions. The appropriate scale for understanding and effective managing protected lands could range significantly in spatial and temporal contents. Remote sensing data with varied spatial resolutions and spectral coverage can play a significant role in monitoring sensitive indicators, such as land cover change and dynamics of landscape patterns, trends in geographic extent and distribution of invasive exotic species, insects and pathogens through vegetation indices, as well as human population and socioeconomic indicators that are critical for regional ecological securities.