Identification of Key Patches for Biodiversity Conservation Based on Possibility of Connectivity Method

Currently, large amount of habitats of wildlife have been displaced by artificial structures because of urban expansion. As a result, smaller patches of habitat have been lost, larger patches have become fragmented, and some of the habitats become lonely islands which will have weaker and weaker contact with outside. Therefore, the optimization of landscape structure will benefit more for biodiversity conservation by analyzing the best landscape layout as the patches have been rapidly lost. In this article, we have analyzed and reclassified the spatial pattern of the value of biodiversity based on the possibility of connectivity method which enabled the possibility of the identification of key patches. In the results, we have found that biodiversity value was not evenly distributed with patch area because of the difference of connectivity. Key patches of Beijing have been classified into three categories: (1) patches with larger area; (2) satellite patches around large patches; (3) stepping-stone patches with high connectivity.