Improvement and Practice of Evaluation Method of Vegetation Ecological Resilience under Drought Stress

Abstract

In the context of increasing global drought, what are the differences in the response and recovery characteristics of different vegetation to drought? The existing research mainly focuses on one aspect of vegetation resistance or recovery, lacking a comprehensive quantitative evaluation method of vegetation ecological resilience. The quantitative methodology for assessing vegetation resistance and recovery from drought, utilizing gross primary productivity (GPP), is refined in this paper. These two indicators of vegetation resistance and recovery are combined to develop an evaluation strategy for assessing vegetation ecological resilience under drought conditions. Taking the Yellow River Basin as an example, the results showed that the vegetation ecological resilience of the Yellow River Basin under drought stress showed a downward trend from 1982 to 2018. Spatially, the distribution of low resilience in arid and semiarid areas in the north and high resilience in river source and downstream areas is presented. The ecological resilience of woodland is the highest, that of grassland is the lowest. It helps to gain a deeper understanding of the drought adaptation mechanism of vegetation in the Yellow River Basin under the background of climate change, and provides support for the sustainable development of the vegetation ecosystem under environmental change.