Biodiversity and vertical structure indices – usefulness in forest management
Main Article Content
Abstract
The majority of forested area in Portugal was planted in 20th century. Extended plantations were performed with maritime pine and with the fast-growing exotic species Eucalyptus globulus make up a large proportion of the forest land (60%). Opinions differ as to the value of the new forests for biodiversity, but numerous studies have highlighted the positive value of planted forests for wildlife. This study was performed in order to carry out a comparison of biodiversity in planted areas on a range of varied sites, similarly attempts to compare biodiversity in planted areas with remnant native forests. In other words, our research aimed at obtaining information on the type/levels of biodiversity in planted forests; evaluating the contribution of planted areas to conservation of native flora through the comparison with native broadleaved stands; identifying indicators by relating the diversity to vegetation and stand structure variables. This study was carried out in Centro Region in Portugal, a photo-interpretation was used to identify land cover/uses types, a multi-scale forest inventory was applied to assess forest stands biodiversity. In recent years identity of biodiversity indicators is a research priority, indicators included in the study were deadwood, vertical stand structure and alpha and beta biodiversity indicators, assessing tree, shrub and herbs layers in the stands. Tested alpha and beta indicators revealed useful to assess biodiversity among forest type, Broadleaved stands presented higher diversity than the planted stands. Deadwood was related to the lack of silvicultural practices, vertical structure index revealed some weakness.
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
References
Chiarucci A., Dominics V. y Wilson J.B. 2005. Structure and floristic diversity in permanent monitoring plots in forest ecosystems of Tuscany. Forest Ecology and Management. 141: 201-210.
Colwell R.K. y Coddington J.A. 1994. Estimating terrestrial biodiversity through extrapolation. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London Series B. 345: 101-118.
Couteron P. 2004, "Additive apportioning of species diversity: towards more sophisticated models and analyses." Oikos, 107: 215-221.
DGRF. 2001. Inventário Florestal Nacional. Direcção Geral das Florestas, Lisboa.
FAO. 2001. State of the world’s forests. 2001. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome.
Ferris R y Humphrey, JW. 1999. A review of potential biodiversity indicators for application in British forests. Forestry 72: 313-328.
Fidalgo F., Salas G. R. Gaspar. J. y P. Morais. 2007. Monitoring land cover change in a forested landscape in Central Portugal. The role of structural indices. IV International Land Management Congress, November, San Luis Potosi, Mexico. 13-16.
Fischer R. y Pommerening A. 2003. Methodology for stand structure assessments in the biodiversity test phase 2003 - 2005 of EU/ICP Forests. Federal Research Centre for Forestry and Forest Products - ForestBIOTA (Forest Biodiversity Test-phase Assessments), Hamburg, pp 11.
Fournier E. y Loreau M. 2001. Respective roles of recent hedges and forest patch remnants in the maintenance of groundbeetle (Coleoptera: Carabidae) diversity in an agricultural landscape. Landscape Ecology, 16: 17-32.
Gering J. C., Crist T. O. y Veech J.A. 2003. "Additive Partitioning of Species Diversity across Multiple Spatial Scales: Implications for Regional Conservation of Biodiversity." Conservation Biology, 17, pp. 488–499.
Humphrey J.W., Ferris R., Jukes, M.R., y Peace A.L. 2002. The potential contribution of conifers plantations to the UK biodiversity action plan. Botanical Journal of Scotland, 54: 49-52.
Lähde E., Laiho O., Norokorpi Y. y Saksa T. 1999. Stand structure as the basis of diversity index. Forest Ecology and Management 115(2-3): 213-220.
Latham P., Zuuring H.R., y Coble DW. 1998. A method for quantifying vertical forest structure. Forest Ecology and Management. 104: 157-170.
MacArthur R.H. 1955. The fluctuations of animal populations and a measure of community stability. Ecology. 36: 533- 536.
Magurran A. E. 1988, Ecologycal Diversity and its Measurement. Princeton University Press, Princeton.
Moreno C. E. y Halffter G. 2000. Assessing the completeness of bat biodiversity inventory using species accumulation curves. Journal of Applied Ecology, 37: 149-158.
Nagai M. y Yoshida T. 2006. Variation in understory structure and plant species diversity influenced by silvicultural treatments among 21-to-26 year-old Picea glehnii plantations. Journal of Forest Research. 11:1-10.
Noss R. F. 1990. Indicators for monitoring biodiversity: A hierarchical approach. Conservation Biology 4: 355-364.
O’Hara K.L., Latham, P.A. y Valappil N. 1995. Parameters for describing stand structure. In: Skovsgaard, J.P., Burkhart, H.E. (Eds.), Recent Advances in Forest Mensuration and Growth and Yield Research. Ministry of Environment and Energy, Danish Forest and Landscape Research Institute, Hørsholm, Denmark, pp. 134–145.
Peet R. K. 1974. The measurement of species diversity. Ann. Rev. Ecol. Syst., 5.
Rabl K. 1993. Totholz - wichtiger Teil im forstlichen Ökosystem. Österreichische Forstzeitung. 12.
Rondeux J. 1993. «La mesure des arbres et de peuplements forestiers». Les Presse Agronomiques de Gembloux, Belgique.
Salas G.R., Fidalgo B., Gaspar J. y Morais P. 2005. Relatório final do projecto FORSEE. Gestion durable des forêts: un réseau européen de zones pilote pour la mise en oeuvre opérationnelle – FORSEE. FEDER – INTERREG IIIB. Subtarefa indicadores de biodiversidade. Manutenção, conservação e fomento apropriado da diversidade biológica nos ecossistemas florestais.
Salas G.R., Houllier F., Lemoine B. y Pierrat J.C. 1993. Representativité locale des placettes d'inventaire en vue de l'estimation des caracteristiques dendrométriques de peuplement. Annales des Sciences Forestières. 50: 469-485.
Samuelsson J., Gustafsson L. y Ingelög T. 1994. Dying and dead trees: a review of their importance for biodiversity. Swedish Environmental Protection Agency report series. Rep. 4306. Uppsala: Swedish Threatened Species Unit.
da Silveira Cardoso P. 2001. Contribuição para o onhecimento da flora vascular da Serra do Açor e respectiva interpretação fitogeográfica. Tese de doutoramento em Biologia (Ecologia) apresentada à Fac. de Ciências e Tecnologia de Coimbra, Portugal.
Simmering D., Waldhardt R. y Otte A. 2006. "Quantifying determinants contributing to plant species richness in mosaic landscapes: a single- and multi-patch perspective". Landscape Ecology, 21: 1233–1251.
Soberón J. y Llorente J. 1993. The use os species accumulation functions for the prediction of species richness. Conservation Biology, 7: 480-488.
Schuck M., Parvaienen J. y Bücking W. 1994. Occurrence of rare and threatened insects living on decaying Populus tremula. Scandinavian Journal of Forest Research. 9: 185-191.
Wagner H. H. y Edwards P. J. 2001. Quantifying habitat specificity to assess the contribution of a patch to species richness at a landscape scale. Landscape Ecology, 16: 121- 131.
Whittaker R. H. 1977. Evolution of species diversity in land comunities." Evolutionary Biology, 10: 1-67.