Abstract:

In recent years,due to the exploitation of the gold mine along the Ertix River,Xinjiang,China and the intensive grazing,the local ecological environment has deteriorated drastically.The ecological restoration of the mining areas is a hot issue for scholars at home and abroad.By using reasonable ecological restoration measures in damaged mining areas can not only reduce their selfrecovery period,but also form different community types that adapt to the special habitat of the mining areas,enhancing the species diversity and ecological stability.In this context,this paper takes the abandoned gold mining areas along the Ertix River as the research object to investigate 5 different restoration measures using sampling experiments started in October 2011.The five kinds of measures included the artificial soil covering (the soil was taken around the experimental area,and then the soil was evenly applied to cover the surface after the surface levelling,and the thickness was generally 2 to 3 cm),the blackcurrant planting (Planting black currant on the land after the surface levelling),water replenishment treatment (the spring flood was introduced to the experimental area,mainly in the form of flood overflow and river water supply near the experimental site of the river.),sheep encamping (in order to improve the soil nutrient conditions and optimize the vegetation growth environment),mud distribution by spraying (water and soil were mixed at a volume ratio of 9∶1,and then pumped out with a water pump and sprayed evenly in the experimental area.) and the sheep dung coverage (the soil was directly covered by the sheep manure at a thickness of 0.5 cm,1 cm,1.5 cm,and 2.0 cm in the test sites respectively after the surface levelling,and the recovery effect was observed one year later).By setting eight experimental areas with a size of 400 m×200 m (56 sample plots all together),the type,frequency,height and other indicators of the species in each experimental site were recorded,and the aboveground biomass of the vegetation was determined by the harvest method.The effects of the difference restoration measures (planting blackcurrants,artificial hydration,flocking,etc.) on species diversity and biomass of the plant were analyzed by using the statistical s/w packages SPSS and Excel.The results show as follows: (1) by adopting different restoration measures,the ecological environment of the damaged mining area has been significantly improved,and the number of species in each plant community has been increased by 5% to 30%. (2) From the perspective of the vegetation community structure,vegetation coverage,aboveground biomass and species diversity,the effect of the measures of A5 (corralling flock),A4 (water supplement),A3 (covering soil and planting blackcurrants) were much better. (3) There was a significant positive correlation between species diversity and aboveground biomass (P <0.05) by regression analysis.This study could provide reference for vegetation restoration and reconstruction in similar mining areas.

Key words: the Ertix River, artificial restoration measures, mining area, species diversity, biomass