Human activities and native vegetation structure drive plant invasion in arid agricultural regions of northwest China

While human activity, resource opportunity, and biotic resistance are recognized as key drivers of plant invasions, their relative importance in agricultural landscapes, particularly arid and semi-arid regions, remains poorly understood. This study assessed how the relative richness and relative coverage of invasive plants respond to these factors in the Ili River Basin. Based on plant community surveys conducted across 78 plots, we used beta regression to examine the relative richness and relative coverage of invasive plants in relation to human activities (including time to city, population density, and cropland proportion), abiotic variables (including macroclimate and soil nutrients), and community structures (e.g., native herbaceous plant richness and total basal area TBA of trees, etc). Variance partitioning and random forest analyses were used to evaluate the relative importance of different predictors.  Multiple regressions showed that both relative richness and relative co..., (a) Study region.
The Ili River Basin, located in central Asia, extends across both China and Kazakhstan. This study focused on the section within China (80.16°-91.03°E, 40.24°-49.18°N), characterized by a continental temperate arid climate. The mean annual precipitation (MAP) ranges from approximately 200 to 800 mm and generally increases with elevation. The mean annual temperature (MAT) varies between 4°C and 18°C and generally decreases with elevation (Pueppke et al., 2018).
(b) Vegetation community surveys
Plant community surveys were conducted in July 2023, during the peak growth season, focusing on agricultural areas of the Ili River Basin where invasive plants are concentrated. To effectively examine the distribution patterns of invasive plant species and their influencing factors, this study established 78 plots, each containing at least one invasive species. These plots were established covering all county-level administrative regions within the Ili River Basin, spanning approx..., , # Human activities and native vegetation structure drive plant invasion in arid agricultural regions of northwest China

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.np5hqc04k](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.np5hqc04k)

## Description of the data and file structure

File: invasive_plants_Ili250715.csv

### Files and variables

* plot: Site number, YL001-YL078
* type: Habitat type of sites, including roadside, ditchside, and field boundary
* Lon (E°): the longitude of sites
* Lat (N°): the latitude of sites 
* Elevation (m): the elevation of sites
* Time to city (min): Travel time to the nearest city
* p_cropland within 2 km: the proportion of cropland area within a 2 km radius buffer around the sites
* population density (person/km²): population density
* TBA (cm²): total basal area of woody plants in each site
* height_native: mean height (m) of non-invasive plants in each site
* SES_MPD: the standardized mean phylogenetic distance for invasive and non-invasive plants within the same site.
* P_peren...,