Land use spatial pattern characteristics along the terrain gradient in Yellow River Basin in west Henan province, China

The spatial pattern of land use/cover was quantitative analyzed by using DEM data. The results show that: (1) the spatial distribution rule of land use/cover with the change of elevation and slope has notable characteristic. The agricultural land, construction land, orchard, water and wetland in strongly human-disturbed land use types mainly distribute in lower altitude region and smaller gradient section. The forest, grass and unused land in slightly human-disturbed land use types are dispersed in higher altitude region and bigger gradient section equably, (2) the spatial distribution of land use within slope classes also has some rules. The proportion of agricultural land and forest land is too large because of which is dominant in the position of controlling at small slope section. In contrast, the forest land is dominant at big slope section, and increase of its proportion has been accompanied by the successive increasing of altitudinal and slope.