Spatial pattern and landscape change prediction of blowouts in sandy grassland

Abstract Blowouts are a common type of wind-eroded landform found in sandy and desertified areas. They also represent a major degradative surface process affecting grassland ecosystems. Blowouts exacerbate changes in surface morphology through their effects on other surface phenomena including vegetation. In this paper, Xilingol League sandy grassland blowouts are taken as the research object, and the U.S. Keyhole satellite data and China’s Gaofen-1 satellite data are used as the data source, and the blowouts are extracted based on the 3 S technology for a total of six periods of high-resolution remote sensing image data in the study area from 1962 to 2023. The Landscape Pattern Index method and Fuzzy Land Use Simulation (FLUS) modelling applied to changes over the last six decades provided spatial evolution parameters for predicting future blowout distributions. Results showed that blowouts affecting the Xilingol grassland area increased by 16.81% over the past 60 years. The patch density (PD) increased by 0.9 per hectare. The mean proximity index (PROX_MN) and mean Euclidean nearest neighbour distance (ENN_MN) showed a tendency to decrease and then increase indicating initial expansion and then merging of adjacent blowouts to create the present landscape. The FLUS model used ten factors to predict changes in blowout distributions from 2023 to 2033. Factors included digital elevation model (DEM), slope, aspect, normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), mean annual temperature, mean annual precipitation, population density, real GDP, distance to water, and distance to impervious surfaces. It was found that grassland area decreased by 6217.12 hm2 and blowout area decreased by 102.91 hm2. Results of this study can expand understanding of blowout morphodynamics in ecologically sensitive areas.