Creation of Ordu province Medrese microcatchment landslide susceptibility map and evaluation of landslide susceptible areas in terms of silviculture

The aim of this study was to evaluate the landslide susceptibility of the Medrese micro-basin in the province of Ordu and to investigate the protective effect of forests by showing the relationship between landslides caused by stabilisation problems and the interventions made on the land in terms of sustainable land use (agriculture, forest, pasture and settlement areas). In the initial phase of the thesis study, a landslide inventory map was constructed by integrating historical and contemporary data from both field and office-based research. A landslide susceptibility map was created for the study area using Random Forest (RF), one of the machine learning methods, based on the landslide inventory and the factors forming these landslides. A total of 16 parameters were evaluated in the susceptibility analysis. The landslide susceptibility map is classified into five categories, namely very low, low, medium, high and very high susceptibility. The results demonstrated that elevation had the greatest impact on landslide susceptibility, accounting for 19.1% of the total effect. Drainage density was identified as the second most influential factor, contributing 15.1% to the overall susceptibility. In contrast, land use exhibited the lowest effect, accounting for only 0.9% of the total susceptibility. In light of the protective function of forests in landslide-prone areas, an evaluation was conducted to determine the optimal silvicultural interventions for forests in these regions.