2013 Volume 18 Issue 1 Pages 19-31
Satoyama is a rural landscape consisting of a diverse mosaic of agricultural and nonagricultural land that provides suitable habitats not only for habitat specialists but also for multi-habitat dwellers. In the present study, we examined land-cover data at an appropriate combination of spatial scale and resolution, to calculate a land-cover heterogeneity index for the state of biodiversity in the Satoyama landscape. We used spatial distribution data of aquatic organisms typical of the Satoyama landscape in the examinations, which were obtained by participatory monitoring in Fukui prefecture. We calculated heterogeneity indices for 12 combinations of spatial unit sizes and land-cover resolutions: four different spatial unit sizes (2×2km^2, 5×5km^2, 6×6km^2, 10×10km^2) and three different land-cover resolutions (50m, 500m, 1000m), and analyzed the relationships between the indices and distributions of 21 aquatic species using Bayesian hierarchical models. The analysis revealed that the index calculated using a combination of 6×6km^2 spatial unit size and 50m resolution was the best for explaining the distribution of these species. Thirteen of the 21 species examined displayed a significant positive response to the index, suggesting that the index is useful for biodiversity assessments of the Satoyama landscape.
