RESUMO
Based on RS and GIS, this paper studied the forest landscape change during the past ten years in Bilahe forest region, Inner Mongolia, from the aspects of general landscape features, individual patch characteristics, and relationship among patches. The results showed that the forest landscape changed a lot due to the stronger human intervention on forest ecosystem. The general tendency was that the human patches (residential area and cultivated land) were! expanding quickly, whereas the natural patches (forest patches, etc.) were shrinking gradually. The results of area transformation matrix showed that in 1997, 30.87% of cultivated lands were transformed from Quercus mongolica. According to the analysis of landscape heterogeneity, the patches were increased by 68.80%, but their average area was reduced by 4.82%. In 1988, the landscape dominated by few patches changed to a landscape with comparatively even distribution of patches, due to the decrease of landscape dominance and contagion, and the increase of landscape diversity. Based on the analyses of physical geography and social economics in the study area and the regions related, this paper discovered that the most decisive driving forces of landscape changes were fire intervention, deforestation, and reclamation of virgin land.
