The breakdown of socialism caused massive socio-economic and institutional changes that led to substantial agricultural land abandonment. The goal of our study was to identify the determinants of agricultural land abandonment in post-Soviet Russia during the first decade of transition from a state-controlled economy to a market-driven economy (1990–2000). We analyzed the determinants of agricultural land abandonment for approximately 150,550km² of land area in the provinces (oblasts) of Kaluga, Rjazan, Smolensk, Tula and Vladimir in European Russia.

Environmental change can be monitored and assessed by analyzing changes in bird populations. This study employed multivariate factorial kriging (MFK) to determine the multiscale changes in the distribution of five commonly observed bird species to urban environmental change. Areas of metropolitan Taipei were analyzed to determine the extent and effect of land cover. A digital elevation model and normalized difference vegetation index were also constructed. Spatial patterns of variation in bird populations were analyzed by MFK at a regional scale (16 km) and local scale (2 km).

A map showing various urban features, such as buildings, roads, and vegetation, is useful for a variety of urban planning applications. The objective of this study was to incorporate road and parcel GIS data as well as relevant expert knowledge to classify different urban land covers from 1-meter, 4-band NAIP images. Based on a hybrid simultaneous-classification and one-by-one-classification approach, a total of 14 urban classes are classified.

Accurate and timely information about the geographic distribution of irrigated cropland is important for a range of applications including crop assessments, water resources management, drought monitoring, and environmental modeling.

In this paper we present the generic modelling system SITE (SImulation of Terrestrial Environments), a software package to develop and apply models simulating regional land-use dynamics. The modelling system includes (i) a framework managing the model generics and (ii) code templates for the development of rule-based land-use and land-cover change (LUCC) models. SITE comprises built-in methods for e.g. map comparison, model optimization and environmental scenarios.

Information on wetland condition can be used for various decision-making processes for better management of this vital resource. Salt marshes are complex ecosystems that are not well mapped and understood. This research was conducted to assess the potential of high-spatial and high-spectral resolution satellite data to map and monitor salt-marsh vegetation communities of Micalo Island of New South Wales, Australia.

Land-use and land-cover change are important drivers of global environmental change, affecting the state of biodiversity, the global carbon cycle, and other aspects of the earth system. In this article we describe the development of the land-use model LandSHIFT, which aims to simulate land-use and land-cover change on the continental and global scale. The model is based on a “land-use systems” approach, which describes the interplay between anthropogenic and environmental system components as drivers of land-use change.

This paper examines environmental disturbances related to energy development in the Orenburg region through a two-pronged approach. First, it ranks environmental performance per 25 administrative districts based on multidimensional clustering of 10 diagnostic indicators. Second, it examines land-use and land-cover (LULC) patterns in nine western administrative districts by classifying Landsat imagery and quantifying surface disturbance for the year 2001. Spatial analysis and descriptive statistics help identify the most disturbed administrative units.

Fire regimes depend on climate, vegetation structure and human influences. Climate determines the water content in fuel and, in the longer term, the amount of biomass. Humans alter fire regimes through increased ignition frequency and by hindering the spread of fire through fire suppression and fuel fragmentation. Here, we present FIRE LADY (FIre REgime and LAndscape DYnamics), a spatially explicit fire regime model that takes into account daily weather data, topography, vegetation growth, fire behaviour, fire suppression and land use changes.

Understanding the effects of land-cover alterations on ecosystem functioning has become a major challenge in ecological research during the last decade. This has stimulated a rapid growth in research investigating the links between land-cover change and biotic interactions, but to date no study has evaluated the progress towards achieving this scientific goal.

The present study was conducted using secondary database, remote sensing, geographical information system (GIS) and multivariate analysis tools in order to develop Multiple Linear Regression (MLR) models that could be able to predict level of water quality variables using compositional and spatial attributes of land cover in the river basins. The study encompasses 21 river basins with 32 000 Km² area, located in the Chugoku district in West Japan.

We conducted extensive mist netting and radio tracking of common frugivorous, seed-dispersing, and tropical forest-dwelling blue-crowned manakins (Lepidothrix coronata; BCMA) and white-ruffed manakins (Corapipo altera; WRMA) to study their habitat use, movements, breeding success, and seed dispersal potential in the fragmented landscape of southern Costa Rica. We obtained 1354 GPS locations from 20 BCMAs and 4040 GPS locations from 54 WRMAs we tracked. These birds were dependent on forest remnants and rarely moved through open habitats.