Abstract:  Using remote sensing data from the France SPOT and Japan ALOS satellites with 10 meter-resolution in 2009 and 2011, the land use type characteristics in the Liaohe river protection zone were extracted using visual interpretation in the ArcMap module platform of ArcGIS9.3, and the status of ecological recovery in the Liaohe river zone was analyzed. The results show that the land use types in the protection zone in 2009 are dominated by upland, reed wetland and water area, and their total proportion to the whole protection zone is up to 72.9%, while the land use types in 2011 are mainly dominated by waters, reed wetland and grassland, and their total proportion to the whole protection zone is 62.9%. The land use change characteristics from 2009 to 2011 in the protection zone show that most of cultivated areas in 2009 are converted to waters, reed wetland and grassland areas in 2011. Compared with 2009, the cultivated areas decrease significantly and the vegetation coverage area increases 15.4% in 2011.

Key words: Satellite remote sensing images, Visual interpretation, Land use types