Characteristics and Methodology of Ecological Landscape Mapping in Arid Zone

Ecological landscape mapping is one of the fields of thematic mapping.There are some characteristics, such as, the mapping can reveal the features of natural elements and artificial functions and reflect correlative and quantitative relations of all kinds of landscape elements.Furthermore,it has advantages of combining principles with practice.Based on the methodology and principles of remote sensing and GIS, the ecological landscape maps of Hotan,a representative of the arid zone, are made.Meanwhile, some principles and methodology of geographical information science are emphasized for thematic mapping.Especially, the effects of ecological mapping on information identification, information mining, and information integration and information analysis are showed.Moreover, the importance of classification and dynamic changes and analysis of ecological landscapes are pointed out for information cognition and expression and retrieval.