DYNAMIC MONITORING OF LAND COVER IN DONGTING LAKE AREA BETWEEN 1995–2015 WITH LANDSAT IMAGERY

Abstract. In this paper, the Landsat imagery of 1995, 2006 and 2015 is used to monitor land cover change in Dongting Lake area. Our study mainly focuses on five types of land cover: water body, wetland, built-up area, cropland and forest. The land cover change in the Dongting Lake area is comprehensively evaluated by using land cover transfer matrix, land cover change amplitude, and landscape pattern indexes. Our study shows that: (1) the cropland area increased from 48.58 % in 1995 to 53.61 % in 2006, then decreased to 48.85 % in 2015; (2) different from the trend of cropland, the area of water body and wetland decreased in 2006; (3) the forest area steadily increased, to 2015, and there was an increase of 3.46 % during 1995–2015, due to artificial afforestation in the lake area. In terms of the landscape pattern, the landscape fragmentation decreased and the patch connectivity increased.