Natural regeneration and soil fertility in fragments of Brazilian Atlantic Forest with different history of disturbance

• Autor(a) principal: Roder, Ludmila Ribeiro [UNESP]
• Data de Publicação: 2022
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Institucional da UNESP
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/11449/250767
• topic: tropical forests; plants; soil; soil-plant feedbacks; plantas; solo; feedbacks solo-planta; florestas tropicais

Brazilian Atlantic Forest (BAF) is a tropical forest biome that have been dramatically devastated in the past and is still under anthropic action, specially by deforestation and soil degradation, which causes fragmentation processes, implying in severe consequences for biome’s sustainability. This study investigated the natural regeneration and soil fertility in fragments of BAF, characterized by increasing human disturbance histories as: secondary (SF) > disturbed (DF) > late forest (LF). The aim was to understand how and the degree to which BAF fragmentation and human disturbance affected vegetation, soils, and the whole soil-plant relationships and feedbacks. It was investigated the natural regeneration vegetation and soil chemistry at twelve permanent, 2000 m2 plots, distributed across LF, DF, and SF forests. Significant differences were determined by ANOVA. Correlation matrix (CM) and factor analysis (FA) were used for understanding correlations and feedbacks/variability among investigated parameters, respectively. Most of investigated plant and soil parameters showed significant differences (p < 0.05) between more “ancient” formation (LF) vs more “recent” ones (SF), with differences mainly due to soil’s development stage. All investigated forest formations are featured by a great influence of the soil-plant relationships and feedbacks, with a decreasing magnitude as LF → DF → SF. Thus, there is a direct, statistically recognizable impact of both “recent” as well as “ancient” human disturbance on investigated formations. The anthropogenic influence clearly affected not only plant and soil as “separate” systems but the whole complex of interactions and feedbacks among ecosystem components. A decreasing quality in soil and plant parameters was observed as human disturbance increased. It was demonstrated that BAF plant and soil require decades for their recovery after human disturbances, with complex mechanisms and behaviors in the relationships among ecosystem components. The results can be useful for managing future recovery in an ecosystem of worldwide strategic importance.