Abstract:Landscape pattern has a significant and complex effect on soil erosion and sediment delivery in the loess hilly and gully region. This scale dependent effect is a central problem to be solved in landscape ecology. In this study, the watersheds from Hekou to Longmen(Helong section), where 42 hydrological stations located, were selceted as the study area in the loess hilly and gully region. Specially, soil erosion modulus, sediment transport modulus and sediment delivery ratio were used as the indices to represent features of soil erosion and sediment delivery process in each watershed. Effects of landscape pattern on soil erosion and sediment delivery process were systematically analyzed based on landscape metrics and canonical correspondence analysis (CCA) at patch-class level. The results indicated that the spatial variation of soil erosion and sediment process has a close relationship with patch classes. Landscape metrics affecting the spatial variation of soil erosion and sediment processes varies with land use categories. The landscape metrics, which had significant influences on soil erosion and sediment delivery, include mean patch area of grassland (AREA_MN3), percentage of landscape area of residential land (PLAND5), patch density of residential land (PD5) and patch density of other land use types (PD6). Futhermore, patch density is a landscape metrics that could impact on both soil erosion and sediment delivery. Landscape pattern characteristics of grassland, residential land, and other land use types have more significant influences on soil erosion and sediment delivery than the remaining landscape classes. This study suggested that on exploring the relationship between landscape pattern and ecological process, not only the impacts of the whole landscape pattern on ecological process should be examined, but also the effects of each single class and their patterns in the landscape on eological process should be considered.