Analysis of Glacier Area Variations in Geladandong Region from 1999 to 2020

The Geladandong region, a source of the Tuotuo River, the primary source of the Yangtze River, is an essential ecological protection region in China. The study of glacier classification accuracy in Geladandong is still limited. Based on the Landsat remote sensing images, the second glacier inventory, a digital elevation model, and meteorological data, we used the random forest method to accurately classify glacial and non-glacial regions. We compared the changes in annual and interannual glaciers between 1999 and 2020. Besides, we quantitatively assessed the influencing factors of glacier change. The results can be summarized as follows. During the 21 years from 1999 to 2020, the annual and interannual area of glaciers in Geladandong has been shrinking, mainly caused by insufficient precipitation to compensate for the melting of the glaciers due to rising temperatures.