• Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.47 no.4
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• pp.264-271
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• 2023

Environmental crises caused by climate change and human-induced disturbances have become urgent challenges to the sustainability of human beings. These issues can be addressed based on a data-driven understanding and forecasting of ecosystem responses to environmental changes. In this study, we introduce a long-term ecological monitoring system in Korean Long-Term Ecological Research (KLTER), and a plan for the Korean Ecological Observatory Network (KEON). KLTER has been conducted since 2004 and has yielded valuable scientific results. However, the KLTER approach has limitations in data integration and coordinated observations. To overcome these limitations, we developed a KEON plan focused on multidisciplinary monitoring of the physiochemical, meteorological, and biological components of ecosystems to deepen process-based understanding of ecosystem functions and detect changes. KEON aims to answer nationwide and long-term ecological questions by using a standardized monitoring approach. We are preparing three types of observatories: two supersites depending on the climate-vegetation zones, three local sites depending on the ecosystem types, and two mobile deployment platforms to act on urgent ecological issues. The main observation topics were species diversity, population dynamics, biogeochemistry (carbon, methane, and water cycles), phenology, and remote sensing. We believe that KEON can address environmental challenges and play an important role in ecological observations through partnerships with international observatories.

• Journal of Korean Society of Rural Planning
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.55-62
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• 2024

This study aimed to resolve issues in performance monitoring of the ecological sector of the Agricultural Environment Conservation Program through a comparative study of domestic ecological monitoring cases and to identify suitable performance monitoring methods for the project. To achieve this objective, current performance monitoring of the Agricultural Environment Conservation Program was compared and analyzed with domestic ecological monitoring cases to examine their applicability. Research results indicate that domestic ecological monitoring covers a wide range, making it difficult to diagnose the ecological environment at the village level. Therefore, it seems challenging to use these data for evaluating the performance of residents' activities. To accurately assess performances of participating villages in the project, on-site monitoring of the target areas is essential. For this purpose, efforts should be focused on strengthening on-site monitoring through the establishment of collaborative systems. However, domestic ecological monitoring can be utilized for long-term performance monitoring in the Agricultural Environment Conservation Program. By extracting necessary data on agricultural areas through geographic information and particularly by utilizing survey results according to the 'cultivated land ecosystem' type, long-term performance of the project could be evaluated. Accordingly, this study can serve as foundational research for establishing an ecological performance monitoring plan and system suited to the project.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.18 no.12
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• pp.1399-1410
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• 2009

The study on community structure of benthic macroinvertebrates from wetland Woopo was conducted for the long-term ecological monitoring. The wetland Woopo is located in Changnyeong-Gun, Gyeongsangnam - Do of Korea. In 2006, we investigated the seasonal variation of benthic macroinvertebrates with quantitative and qualitative collecting methods. The collection was performed monthly at four surveying region, Woopo, Sajipo, Mokpo and Topyong stream. In this study, 6 classes, 16 orders, 48 families, 95 species were identified on group of benthic macroinvertebrates. The species diversity index and the species richness index were the highest in Topyung region and it was 3.222 and 10.216 respectively. The two species, Cercion calamorum and Cloeon dipterum were quantitatively collected for 9 months. The changes of body lengths of 50 individuals were recorded and the advanced growth on the two species was expected from present study.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Environmental Restoration Technology
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.135-151
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• 2015

DMZ is considered as an ecologically sensitive landscape and one of the highest biodiversity regions in the Republic of Korea. There have been, albeit the significant value, increased interests in developing this region for a variety of purposes including tourism and commemorative events. As this region has been already facing a range of problems derived from previous development, natural disaster and invasive species, the necessity for active management of ecological health within this region has been increased, which weighs the importance of executing ecological restoration. The objective of this study was to develop evaluation indices as an effective management means of properly evaluating ecological restoration and sustainably maintaining the restored conditions on a long-term scale. Through literature review existing evaluation indices related to restoration were collected, and then the most suitable indices were selected based upon two interviews and one questionnaire survey targeting experts in the relevant field to ecological restoration. They were categorized by two major division and their subclasses (Ecological base - vegetation structure & composition, habitat characteristics, soil environment; landscape ecology - connectivity, landscape patch, boundary & surrounding) and 40 indices. These indices were considered helpful to comprehensively evaluate ecological restoration on degraded environments within ecologically sensitive areas, and sustainably manage target areas by employing a long-term monitoring approach. As this result played a meaningful role in providing the fundamentals of evaluating ecological restoration, it should develop a suitable evaluation system through further research.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Environmental Restoration Technology
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.73-84
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• 2019

In this research, it is a basic study to investigate the population of birds using UAVs. The research area is Ardeidae species(ASP) habitat and has long-term monitoring. The purpose of the study is to compare the ASP populations which analyzed ground observational survey and UAVs imagery. We used DJI's Mavic pro and Phantom4 for this research. Before investigating the population of ASP, we measured the escape distance by the UAVs, and the escape distances of the two UAVs models were statistically significant. Such a result would be different in UAV size and rotor(rotary wing) noise. The population of ASP who analyzed the ground observation and UAVs imagery count differed greatly. In detail, the population(mean) on the ground observation was 174.9, and the UAVs was 247.1 ~ 249.9. As a result of analyzing the UAVs imagery, These results indicate that the lower the UAVs camera altitude, the higher the ASP population, and the lower the UAVs camera altitude, the higher the resolution of the images and the better the reading of the individual of ASP. And we confirmed analyzed images taken at various altitudes, the individuals of ASP was not statistically significant. This is because the resolution of the phantom was superior to that of mavic pro. Our research is fundamental compared to similar studies. However, long-term monitoring for ASP of South Korea's by ground observation is a barrier of the reliability of the monitoring result. We suggested how to use UAVs which can improve long-term monitoring for ASP habitat.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.42 no.4
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• pp.476-486
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• 2009

Major objective of our study was to introduce initial researches of national long-term ecological monitoring studies on Daechung Reservoir, as one of the representative lentic reservoir ecosystems in Korea. For the long-term ecological research (LTER), we conducted preliminary field monitoring during 2008~2009 and analyzed biological parameters such as phytoplankton, zooplankton, and freshwater fish along with chemical water quality and empirical model analysis. According to phytoplankton surveys, major taxa have varied largely depending on seasons and sites sampled. Overall phytoplankton data showed that cyanophyta dominated in the summer period and diatoms dominated in the winter. In zooplankton analysis, 25 species including 20 rotifers, 3 cladocerans and 2 copepods were collected during the survey. The relative abundance of rotifers (86.5%) was always greater than that of cladocerans (6.3%) or copepods (5.1%). There were distinct spatial and inter-annual changes in the abundance of zooplankton in the reservoir, displaying similar patterns in three sites with the exception of S3 during the study. According to fish surveys, 8 families and 39 species were observed during 2008~2009. The most dominant fish was an exotic species of Lepomis macrochirus (23%), indicating an severe influence of exotic species to the ecosystem. TP averaged $17.9\;{\mu}g\;L^{-1}$ ($6{\sim}80\;{\mu}g\;L^{-1}$), which was judged as a mesotrophy, and showed a distinct longitudinal gradients. TN averaged $1.585\;{\mu}g\;L^{-1}$ during the study and judged as hypereutrophic condition. Unlike TP, TN didn't show any large seasonal and spatial variations. Under the circumstances, nitrogen limitation may not happen in this system, indicating that nitrogen control is not effective in the watershed managements. These data generated in the LTER station will provide key information on long-term biological and water quality changes in relation to global warming and some clues for efficient reservoir ecosystem managements.

• Journal of Korean Society of Rural Planning
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.129-139
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• 2019

The purpose of this study is to monitor the long-term vegetation change of the village complementary forest after restoration. Based on the monitoring in 2010, six years after the restoration project in 2004, the monitoring of the complementary forest in Dubang village in 2019 after 9 years was conducted. This study identifies the change of species diversity and structure, growth, vegetation coverage, structural quality etc. and succession through long-term monitoring. For this, field survey was conducted in 2003 and 2010, 2019. The results demonstrate significant increase of species diversity and multi-layer structure and progress of natural succession. Overall, Part I is considered to be a quasi-natural complementary village forest, which has a natural balance between natural vegetation that have remained in nature for a long time and anthropogenic vegetation, revealing the coexistence of nature and humanity. It means ecological structure and function have improved. Part II should be restored to the lost part and adaptive management rather than excessive management should be carried out to leave natural succession.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.371-384
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• 2019

The purpose of this study was to propose an efficient management plan for purchased land considering the hydrological, watershed characteristics and ecological functions of the target land and surrounding area based on the result of monitoring the water quality improvement effect obtained by purchasing the land in the watershed area in the Geum river system. For this purpose, this study investigated through literature review, and examined ways to apply them to this research by deriving implications from a comprehensive analysis of previous research cases. After that, the components of assessment were derived to evaluate the ecological function of the purchase land, and the ecological function evaluation model for each land and area was proposed. In order to select purchase and restoration priorities of the land, this study analyzed the ecological status of the purchased land in main watersheds and tributaries using Arc GIS ver 10.1. Through this, a process to select restoration priorities was developed. And this study constructed the integrated management process with proposing a mid - to long - term plan by integrating the purchased land valuation and restoration priority selection process. Based on this process, this study suggested an effective management plan for purchased land through the integrated ecological management system of lands purchased. It can be used systematically in appraisal valuation, land purchase system, restoration project, and follow-up management of land purchase.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.70-82
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• 2000

This is a study to generate a theoretical base for the development of wildlife corridor as a solution to the problems of wildlife population size reduction and declining bio-diversity resulting from the fragmented habitats caused by road constructions. This study seeks to examine and define techniques in very aspect of wildlife corridor including planning, site selection, design and development, and maintenance through an actual application. The results of this study are as follows. 1) The wildlife corridor should be developed in an approach supplementing a landscape ecological approach and a restoration ecological approach bilaterally. To this end, systematic methodology and process are required. 2) It was restored an ecosystem as close as possible go to the forest ecosystem before road development. In addition, in order to allow it to function as an ecological corridor, topography restoration, stream development, and ecological plantation were implemented. 3) The result of monitoring activities that continued for one year since the development confirmed the migration and inhabitation of a number of animals including small mammals. It is judged that it functions as a corridor in fragmented habitats as initially expected. 4) Through continuous monitoring in the future, the effects of corridor development on ecological restoration need to be reviewed in a long-term perspective. There is also a need to develop and refine a comprehensive maintenance plan for wildlife corridors and their surroundings. Based on such study results, actual data on the development of wildlife corridor should be accumulated. In follow-up studies, after continuous monitoring for a long period of time, the effects of wildlife corridor development should be evaluated comprehensively and wildlife corridor applicable to Korea should be standardized by correcting disclosed problems.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.459-472
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• 2016

We assessed the distribution of benthic macroinvertebrate at four surveying sites in Upo Wetland, a Ramsar site and the largest wetland in Korea, from February 2006 to November 2013. A long-term ecological monitoring was done monthly by using quantitative sampling method with dip net for analyzing the community change and correlation between the biodiversity and the environmental factors because environmental factors have a decisive effect on the community structure of the benthic macroinvertebrates. Total samples from the Upo Wetland area were classified into 3 phyla, 6 classes, 17 orders, 68 families, 176 species, and 25,720 individuals. Among the 176 species, 62 of the species had not been previously reported in this area. Asellus sp., Diplonychus esakii, and Gyraulus chinensis were the most common species in Upo Wetland. The change patterns of annual species diversity and species richness were calculated by using the average number of monthly occurring species and individuals. Diversity index increased from March to May and decreased after that showing lower diversity indices in July and August. It increased again in September and in October. Richness index showed similar tendency and fell around February and July, followed by a rising tendency around May and October. Correlation and regression analyses were performed with the change of biodiversity and each environmental factor. We found that water temperature have very significant positive correlation with species diversity in spring, and have significant indices in autumn and winter. On the other hand, precipitation showed a significantly negative correlation value in summer and autumn suggesting it has an effect on the community structure of benthic macroinvertebrates.