Phytosociology and diversity in forest fragments with different intervention historics in the western amazon.

Abstract

In this study, we sought to carry out the floristic and structural characterization of three forest fragments that underwent anthropic intervention, at different time intervals, located in the Environmental Protection Area ‘Lago do Amapá’ in Rio Branco, state of Acre, Brazil. Fragment I has a history of intervention for the formation of pasture and timber extraction in the 1960s. Fragment II has a history of intervention for cutting/burning and planting in the 1970s and Fragment III has a history of intervention for the formation of pastures in the 1980s. For floristic and phytosociological sampling, two plots per fragment measuring 0.5 hectares each (20 m x 250 m) were allocated, totaling an area of three ha. All arboreal individuals with DBH ≥ 10 cm were inventoried. Phytosociological parameters such as dominance, density, frequency, Importance Value (IV) and basal area were calculated. The diversity between fragments was obtained using the Shannon-Weaver index (H’) and similarity using the Jaccard index. The comparisons of means were performed using the Tukey test with 5% significance. Altogether, 1,427 individuals were inventoried, distributed in 44 families and 193 species. The H’ diversity indices found were: 4.21 for Fragment I, 3.74 for Fragment II and 3.50 for Fragment III. The Jaccard index showed a greater similarity between fragments II and III. Fragment I differed statistically from the others in relation to the basal area, number of genera and species. The medium strata (height class 8 ≤ h <16.93) had the largest number of individuals. Regarding the diametric classes, a greater number of first-class individuals was observed, following the inverted J pattern in all fragments. The result of the study pointed out that the fragment with the oldest history of anthropization has structure, richness and diversity of species distinct from the other fragments. © 2021, Universidade Federal de Santa Maria. All rights reserved.