Abstract

MORALES-HERNANDEZ, JULIO CESAR; CARRILLO-GONZALEZ, FÁTIMA MACIEL; FARFAN-MOLINA, LUIS MANUEL  and  CORNEJO-LOPEZ, VÍCTOR MANUEL. Vegetation change cover in the coastal region of Bahia de Banderas, Mexico. Caldasia [online]. 2016, vol.38, n.1, pp.17-29. ISSN 0366-5232.  https://doi.org/10.15446/caldasia.v38n1.57831.

Historically there have been adverse natural events such as tropical cyclones and forest fires, which have led to important changes in the coverage of natural vegetation. Moreover, in recent decades human activities have become the main trigger of the transformation of ecosystems, modifying or destroying them with the development of excessive in relation to the capacity of natural systems and resources economic activities. This has intensified in recent years in the region of Banderas Bay, which increases their vulnerability to severe natural phenomena. For analysis of time series and observe the change of vegetation cover in the study area, a supervised classification was performed by using a Geographic Information System (GIS). In which the surfaces of vegetation in three coastal municipalities were identified and compared with those reported in the national forest inventory 2003. Three mulches were obtained: Deciduous Forest, Deciduous Forest Medium and forest areas; plus 2 land uses: Urban Soil and agricultural areas. The results show that there is a process of change and replacement of coverage and land use, where the greatest growth is occurring in applications related to agriculture, including dynamic processes such as conversion to secondary growth, at the expense of areas of forests, with the greatest rate of deforestation in recent times.

Keywords : Vegetal coverage; deforestation; Bahía de Banderas.

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