Ecological Resources Capability Zoning of Kasilian Representative Catchment for Agriculture Using GIS

This research was carried out based on systematic analysis approach for evaluation of ecological resources capability of Kasilian representative catchment for agricultural land use. The study area is located in southern of Mazandaran province. In this study we used topography digital data, paper maps, climatology data, satellite images and GIS, database and spreadsheet software. The process of study was including: ecological resource identification, database creating, data processing, integration of data, and at last modeling of ecological capability for agricultural activities. For creating environmental unit map, the permanent ecological resources were overlaid with binary method and in each stage of the integration process the overlaid layers were coded by Makhduom’s method. At last, the attribute table of environmental unite map was completed with impermanent resources data. Then each unit of environmental unit map was modeled by linear equation of ecological model for agriculture. The Result of this study indicates that the study area was formed of 437 environmental units. Attention with %26 of present Land use of the study area was agricultural land use, but it showed the environmental units have at least one limitation for agricultural activities. The limitation factors for agricultural Land use in study area included: air temperature, rainfall, pH of soil, soil depth, soil formation, soil aggregation, soil drainage, soil texture and slope of the farmland.