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A great amount of forest in Aofengshan has degraded by human-caused fire. The purpose of this thesis was attempt to address the root causes of forest loss and degradation, to analyze the characteristic of fire, and to evaluate the restoration potential of Aofengshan. So we first analyzed the landscape structure and change of Aofengshan by aerial photos, and addressed the association with forest system degradation, then analyzed the fire characteristic and identified the location of fire sensitive area according to the frequency and extent of fire disturbance, and as the last, estimated succession process and stage and evaluated the restoration potential of forest by examining various vegetation type in Aofengshan. From the results, we knew, fire, the forest patches in Aofengshan usually located at drop where are not neighbor to farm road and tomb area directly, the grass matrix usually located at mild slope area with tombs, from 1977 to 2002 the forest have lost 211.5 ha, the total area of grass has grown triple from 71 ha to 222.9ha, and since 2002 the Formosa Free Way was been finished, the forest area has started to grown slowly for the afforestation at the slop side of the road and the natural restoration. Second, the major sources of fire were burning garbage, weed, and paper money uncarefully, that usually occurred from October to April of next year, especially March and April for tomb-sweeping, and there were six among of the twelve fire sensitive areas where the major fire source was burning garbage uncarefully. And third, the most complicate forest ecosystem regenerated naturally in Aofengshan were composed of pioneer plants such as Taiwan acacia, China tree, Chinese tallow-tree,etc. And the regions with good nature conditions would recover to forest again in about six years no matter through natural restoration or afforestation of Taiwan acacia. In conclusion, the root causes of forest degradation in Aofengshan is the uncompatible land use type that causing fire. In general the natural restoration potential is pretty well, but the richness and abundance of seed bank are unsatisfactory. So except fire control, the forest restoration plan in Aofengshan should focus on introducing more local species to regenerate the compose and structure of vegetable cover, and the most important is to regenerate a community recognition about the land use type that compatible with forest restoration of Aofengshan.
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