• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
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• v.44 no.10
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• pp.797-807
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• 2011

Phenomenon of vegetation recruitment on the sand bar is drastically rising in the streams and rivers in Korea. In the 1960s prior to industrialization and urbanization, most of the streams were consisted of sands and gravels, what we call, 'White River'. Owing to dam construction, stream maintenance, etc. carried out since the '70s, the characteristic of flow duration and sediment transport have been disturbed resulting in the abundance of vegetation in the waterfront, that is, 'Green River' is under progress. This study purposed to identify the correlation among water level, water temperature, rainfall, soil moisture and soil texture out of the factors which give an effect on the vegetation recruitment on the sand bar of unregulated stream. To this purpose, this study selected the downstream of Naeseong Stream, one of sand rivers in Korea, as the river section for test and conducted the monitoring and analysis for 289 days. In addition, this study analyzed the aerial photos taken from 1970 to 2009 in order to identify the aged change in vegetation from the past to the present. The range of the tested river section was 361 m in transverse length and about 2 km in longitudinal length. According to the survey analysis, the tested river section in Naeseong Stream was a gaining river showing the higher underground-water level by 20~30 m compared to Stream water level. The difference in the underground water temperature was less than $5^{\circ}C$ by day and season and the Stream temperature did not fall to $10^{\circ}C$ and less from May when the vegetation germination begins in earnest. The impact factor on soil moisture was the underground water level in the lower layer and the rainfall in the upper layer and it was found that all the upper and lower layer were influenced by soil particle size. The soil from surface to 1 m-underground out of 6 soil moisture-measured points was sand with the $D_{50}$ size of 0.07~1.37 mm and it's assumed that the capillary height possible in the particle size would reach around 14~43 cm. On the other hand, according to the result of space analysis on the tested river section of unregulated stream for 40 years, it was found that the artificial disturbance and drought promoted the vegetation recruitment and the flooding resulted in the frequency extinction of vegetation communities. Even though the small and large scales of recruitment and extinction in vegetation have been repeated since 1970, the present vegetation area increased clearly compared to the past. It's found that the vegetation area is gradually increasing over time.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.36 no.1 s.102
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• pp.74-82
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• 2003

This study was carried out to understand how the bird community would change in a stream ecosystem after implementation of close-to-nature river improvement techniques conducted on the Gwacheon, Seocho and Hakyeul reaches in the Yangiae Stream, 'Seoul. At the Gwacheon reach, the number of species and individuals tended to decline. However, at the Seocho reach, the number of species was increased while the number of individuals appeared to be not changed greatly. Especially, density of Dabbling Ducks were rapidly increased. At the Hakyeul reach was both the number of species and the number of individuals were increased. Density of Herons and Dabbling Ducks rose, while density of Wagtails was decreased suddenly. Except the Gwacheon reach, the survey areas were gradually improved in species richness and density after the construction of river improvement. We suggested that the naturally-formed meandering (channel) bar, restoration of riparian vegetation and artificial ponds were helpful for birds habitation, however bicycle path constructed in flood plain was negative.

• Proceedings of the Korea Water Resources Association Conference
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• 2016.05a
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• pp.117-117
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• 2016

The natural hydrologic regime is intimately tied to the structure and function of stream and riparian ecosystems. Consequently, understanding the nature and extent of perturbations to the hydrologic regime, stemming from episodic-to-seasonal and longer-term climatic variations, as well as anthropogenic influences is an important starting point for developing an improved understanding of the coupled human-environmental systems. Herein, we pursued to explicate sensitivity of ecologically relevant flow metrics to climate variability and extremes in the five major river basins, Korea.

• Journal of Wetlands Research
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.139-146
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• 2012

Stream ecosystems carry out significant functions such as water purification, especially denitrification. However, rapid landuse change since industrialization has altered ecological functions of streams. In this study, we aimed to investigate denitrification rates and their determinant factors in streams with different landuse patterns, and how denitrification rates vary with microtopology within streams. Ten fifth streams of each landuse were selected, and each stream was divided into four microtopological sites within streams - riparian zone, subsoil, and both head and tail parts of sand bars. In situ denitrification rates and physicochemical properties of soil were examined. Denitrification rates of agricultural, urban, and forest streams were $289.62{\pm}70.69$, $157.01{\pm}37.06$, $31.38{\pm}18.65mg$ $N_2O-N\;m^{-2}\;d^{-1}$ respectively. There were no significant differences in denitrification rates depending on microtopology, but the rates in riparian zone were the highest, and the rates in the head parts of sandbars were lower than those of tail parts. The determinant factors for denitrification rates included water temperature, silt and clay contents of soil, inorganic nitrogen, and organic carbon, and these factors all showed positive correlations with denitrification rates. Through this study, we find that landuse pattern in watershed region affects denitrification rates that is one of considerable functions of streams. In addition, estimation of denitrification rates taking into account for microtopology would contribute to developing ecological management and restoration strategy of streams.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Environmental Restoration Technology
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.62-73
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• 2003

The study was to apply a mat style reed planting method at confluence to improve plants growth conditions by relaxing disturbed topographical base due to water flow and was intended to review the effect to build up a vegetation strip by monitoring process after the construction. First off, We've attempted to construct reed mats on selected sites as confluences of Tan and Gaehwa stream and then examined and analyzed characteristics of soil and vegetation community. As the results of the examination, the soil texture was proven to be a mix of sand and loamy sand and be 6.3 ~ 7.0 soil pH. In addition, it contained 1.0 ~ 4.6% of organic matter, 0.04 ~ 0.22% of T-N and 27.8 ~ 41.2% of water content. For its vegetation structure, the Tan stream confluence was first actually a point bar without plants prior to the construction but 8 kinds of hygrophytes including Persicaria hydropiper and 9 kinds of terrestrial plants such as Potentilla supina, Artemisia annua, and Alopecurus aequalis var. amurensis. On the other hand, the Gaehwa stream confluence contained 6 kinds of hygrophytes such as Bidens frondosa and other 11 kinds of terrestrial plants prior to the construction while it produced 7 kinds of hygrophytes including Ranunculus ternatus as well as Phragmites australis and 9 kinds of terrestrial plants such as Potentilla supina after the construction. For the Phragmites australis, almost of them was weathered away in early days just after planting because of development period passed, but on May, six months later from planting, it was investigated that its length was approximated as 65 ~ 85cm with 75% coverage and that the number of it was 437 ~ 633/$m^2$. The study was shown that reed mats can improve environmental conditions of disturbed topographical base, enabling natural growth of various riparian vegetation including the introduced plant, reed. In the meantime, it was supposedly judged that to recover or build up a vegetarian strip, supplementary materials should be prepared to help produce and grow plants because it is not probable to expect river drift by water flow at confluence and that corrosion, burying or inundation owing to changes of water lever should be considered.

• Journal of Korean Society for Geospatial Information Science
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.101-111
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• 2015

Stream restoration projects have become threats to riparian ecosystem in Rep. of korea. Riparian wildlife becomes isolated and the animals are often experience difficulties in crossing riparian corridors. The purposes of this study is to select suitable wildlife passages for wild animals crossing riparian corridors. Maximum entropy model and snow tracking data on embankment in winter seasons were used to develop species distribution models to select suitable wildlife passages for water deer. The analysis suggests the following. Firstly, most significant factors for water deer's habitat in area nearby riparian area are shown to distance to water, age-class, land cover, slope, aspect, digital elevation model, tree density, and distance to road. For the riparian area, significant factors are shown to be land cover, size of riparian area, distance to tributary, and distance to built-up. Secondly, the suitable wildlife passages are recommended to reflect areas of high suitability with Maximum Entropy model in riparian areas and the surrounding areas and moving passages. The selected suitable areas are shown to be areas with low connectivity due to roads and vertical levee although typical habitats for water deer are forest, grassland, and farmland. In addition, the analysis of traces on snow suggests that the water deer make a detour around the artificial structures. In addition, the water deer are shown to make a detour around the fences of roads and embankment around farmland. Lastly, the water deer prefer habitats around riparian areas following tributaries. The method used in this study is expected to provide cost-efficient and functional analysis in selecting suitable areas.

• Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.157-164
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• 2010

We evaluated the restoration effect by introducing willows as a means of controlling invasions of giant ragweed (Ambrosia trifida L.) on a riparian site. Our preliminary survey demonstrated that a problematic exotic species, giant ragweed and the representative riparian species, Salix koreensis are in competitive exclusive relationship. We planted willows at 1 m intervals on the bank of the Dongmun stream at Munsan, Paju, in Central Western Korea as an experimental restoration practice. We installed two 50 m $\times$ 5 m sized restored and non-restored for this experimental study. The non-restored plots were located on river banks, which were covered with concrete blocks and left in itself without any treatment. The height of willow was measured after each of three consecutive growing seasons and compared with the height of the giant ragweed. Although the height of Salix gracilistyla did not achieve the height of the giant ragweed, the height of S. koreensis surpassed that of giant ragweed in the third year after introduction. The results were also reflected in the relative light intensity on the herb layer of willow stand, and thereby the relative light intensities of stands, which were dominated by S. koreensis or restored by introducing S. koreensis, 1.99 $\pm$ 0.33 (%, mean $\pm$ SD) and 1.92 $\pm$ 0.50 (%, mean $\pm$ SD), respectively were lower than those in the stands treated by S. gracilistyla, 3.01 $\pm$ 0.43 (%, mean $\pm$ SD). The giant ragweed stands receive full sunlight as there are no any vegetation layers higher than the herb layer formed by the giant ragweed. As the result of Detrended Correspondence analysis ordination based on naturally established vegetation, the stands dominated by willows and giant ragweed showed different species composition between both stands. The species composition of the restoratively treated sites resembled the reference sites more than the non-treated sites. The species diversity (H') of the sites restored by introducing S. koreensis and S. gracilistyla was higher than the non-restored site dominated by A. trifida. On the basis of our results, the restoration of riparian vegetation equipped with integrated features could contribute not only to the control of exotic plants including giant ragweed but also to ensure the diversity and stability of riverine ecosystems.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.48 no.1
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• pp.68-76
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• 2015

There is no willow riparian vegetation in Jeju Island, Korea. Instead, a genetically-isolated population of Adina rubella is found in some parts of the riparian system. We describe its syntaxonomy and synecology. A total of 27 phytosociological relev$\acute{e}$s were collected, 11 relev$\acute{e}$s from 91 sites and 16 relev$\acute{e}$s from the previously published relevant materials. Data were analyzed by traditional Braun-Blanquet method and multivariate PCoA (Principal coordinates analysis). New syntaxa are distinguished, Adinion rubellae all. nov. and its type association Tripogono-Adinetum rubellae ass. nov. with two subassociations, typicum and rhododendretosum poukhanensae. Adino-Rhododendretum poukhanensae Itow et al. 1993 was discarded owing to mismatch of syntaxonomy and syngeography of Adina and Rhododendron phytocoena. The alliance Adinion is Jeju's regional and partly ombrotrophic vegetation occurring in pothole and rock crevice where are independent on ground-water table. We also suggest a revised alliance, Rhododendrion poukhanensae Lee 2004 ex. hoc loco in Korean peninsula, as a corresponding syntaxon to Adinion, which completely differs from Phragmito-Salicion. Finally we pointed out that Adina phytocoena requiring an absolutely monitoring has been threatened by river maintenance project of local government.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.620-628
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• 2012

This study addressed the influence of forest harvesting on seasonal water table dynamics in small headwater riparian areas. Four treatments including potential Best Management Practices(BMPs) for ephemeral and intermittent streams were implemented(BMP1, BMP2, clearcut and reference). Water table measurements were obtained at bi-monthly intervals for 3 years including one year of pre- and two years of post-harvest observations. Overall, water table responses affected largely by rainfall amount. In addition, significant increases in water table levels following harvesting occurred throughout the two post-harvest years. Water table levels increased up to 28.2cm in the clearcut treatment during 2008 and up to 54.2cm in BMP2 during 2009. However, increase in water table elevation was not directly related to basal area removal despite considerable differences in basal area removed between BMP2 and clearcut treatments. Water table rises were apparent in that water table were more elevated during dry season(June through November) than during wet season(December through May). These seasonal fluctuations were presumably driven by changes in evapotranspiration caused by differences in leaf area of overstory canopy and understory following harvest.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.105-117
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• 2018

This study conducted health assessment and multivariate vegetation analysis using the riparian vegetation index in 30 sites of the Geumgang mainstream and Mihocheon to obtain practical data on the river management of the Geumgang. The result showed that the number of plant communities was 54. The flora was 75 families, 185 genera, 243 species, 2 subspecies, 21 varieties, 2 varieties, and 268 taxa. The riparian vegetation index was 38.3 (3.3; G-D1 ~ 66.7; G-U2, G-U4, and G-M3), and the health of the rivers in this area was evaluated as normal (grade C). The health of rivers was the highest in the upper stream of Geumgang mainstream and lowest in the downstream of Geumgang mainstream. The relationship between riparian vegetation index and chlorophyll-a content was low. The riparian vegetation was divided into five groups of Digitaria ciliaris colony group, Salix gracilistyla colony group, Erigeron annuus colony group, the group dominated by Humulus japonicus, Salix koreensis, Miscanthus sacchariflorus, and Phragmites japonica colonies, and the group dominated by Conyza canadensis and Echinochloa crusgalli var. echinata colonies. They had the similar health conditions. The CCA analysis showed that the environmental factors affecting the distribution of vegetation were physical factors such as vegetation area, artificial structure area, waterway area, branch width, channel width, and bank height and the biological factors such as the number of species. As such, it is necessary to maintain the health condition through continuous monitoring where the health condition is high and to apply active measures such as ecological restoration where the health condition is low.