ABSTRACT As the global trend of habitat fragmentation and plantation establishment continues to rise, the amount of habitat that can be provided by plantations for native forest-dwelling fauna becomes increasingly pertinent. Potential benefits of plantation establishment for fauna are often dependent on the vegetation they replace, as converting native forest or natural non-forest ecosystems to plantation forest is detrimental to biodiversity. However, establishing plantation forests on previously cleared land may increase landscape heterogeneity by providing movement corridors and complementary forest habitat. Here, we present a case study of the expansion of plantation forestry in south-west Victoria, Australia, and discuss implications for koalas and other forest-dwelling fauna. Using the Hansen Global Forest Change v1.4 (2000–2016) dataset and Google Earth Engine, we quantified the amount of recent landscape change (forest cover gain and loss) attributed to plantations in south-west Victoria from 2000 to 2016 and determined the area of plantations established adjacent to native forest. We observed high levels of landscape change during the study period, with harvested plantations accounting for 70.5% (81 490 ha) of all forest lost and established plantations accounting for 75.4% (98 388 ha) of all forest gained. Of those plantations established, 34% (13 056 ha) occurred within 1 km of native forest, while only 2.8% (690 ha) occurred within 100 m of native forest. Our analysis highlights the importance of planting and harvesting regimes that consider overall landscape configuration as well as the spatial arrangement of plantations adjacent to native forest. Such considerations may increase plantation value to wildlife and overall biodiversity by enabling higher levels of functional connectivity, limiting habitat isolation and facilitating the movement of wildlife within and beyond plantation forests.

中文翻译：

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量化人工林扩张导致的景观变化：维多利亚州西南部考拉区的案例研究

摘要随着栖息地破碎化和人工林建立的全球趋势持续上升，人工林可为原生林栖动物群提供的栖息地数量变得越来越重要。为动物群建立人工林的潜在利益通常取决于它们所取代的植被，因为将原始森林或天然非森林生态系统转变为人工林不利于生物多样性。然而，通过提供运动走廊和互补的森林栖息地，在先前清理过的土地上建立人工林可能会增加景观异质性。在这里，我们介绍了澳大利亚维多利亚州西南部人工林扩张的案例研究，并讨论了对考拉和其他林栖动物群的影响。使用 Hansen Global Forest Change v1。4 (2000-2016) 数据集和谷歌地球引擎，我们量化了 2000 年至 2016 年维多利亚西南部人工林造成的近期景观变化（森林覆盖的增加和减少），并确定了与原始森林相邻的人工林面积. 我们在研究期间观察到了高度的景观变化，采伐的人工林占所有森林损失的 70.5%（81490 公顷），建立的人工林占所有森林增加的 75.4%（98388 公顷）。在已建立的人工林中，34%（13056 公顷）位于原始森林 1 公里范围内，而只有 2.8%（690 公顷）位于原始森林 100 米范围内。我们的分析强调了考虑整体景观配置以及与原始森林相邻的人工林的空间布置的种植和采伐制度的重要性。