GradientLand Software: A landscape change gradient generator

- Landscape ecology studies often need applications that simulate neutral landscapes.
- We developed an innovative software that can easily handle the generation of such landscape models.
- Named “GradientLand”, it can generate both neutral random or fractal lattice landscapes.
- It can be used to study various issues in landscape and spatial ecology.

In landscape ecology, there is a lack of free software that can simulate sequential processes of habitat loss using neutral landscape models. Such a tool would come to the benefit of our understanding of the effects of landscape changes on ecological processes without the need for finding or manipulating appropriate natural landscapes, something both unfeasible and sometimes unethical. This paper presents a free software, named GradientLand, as a tool for generating simulated sets of habitat loss gradients as random and fractal neutral landscapes. GradientLand is easy to handle, with an intuitive interface to create a wide array of habitat cover gradient arrangements. With this tool, we target students, teachers and researchers interested in landscape ecology and issues related to habitat loss and landscape change.