WOODY PLANTS DIVERSITY IN SOME PRIMARY AND SECONDARY FORESTS IN PENANG, MALAYSIA
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Published:
Oct 31, 2020
Keywords:
Penang Euphorbiaceae Knema curtisii Lianas Trees
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Abstract
The richness and diversity of woody plants are important indices for maintaining and conserving tropical forests. In this study, we evaluated the alpha diversity and richness indices of some ecologically important primary and old secondary forests in Penang, Malaysia. Plots of size 2000 m2 which were further divided into 5 subplots of size 20 x 20 m2 were established in each of five forests reserves across Penang. A total of 1,161 individuals of trees and lianas belonging to 54 different families and 284 species were enumerated in all the studied forests. Euphorbiaceae, Clusiaceae and Dipterocarpaceae were the most prominent families with highest number of species. Vatica bella was the most abundant plant with 127 individuals. Knema curtisii, Gluta elegans, Mangifera gracilipes and Callerya atropurpurea were more common to all the forests. All the forests could be described as highly rich in woody plant species and diverse due to the high diversity indices estimated. There is virtually no much difference in the diversity indices between the primary and old secondary forests probably due to the recuperating nature of the old secondary forests after years of abandonment.
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Rahmad, Z., Akomolafe, G. F., & Asyraf, M. (2020). WOODY PLANTS DIVERSITY IN SOME PRIMARY AND SECONDARY FORESTS IN PENANG, MALAYSIA. Malaysian Journal of Science, 39(3), 132–158. https://doi.org/10.22452/mjs.vol39no3.11
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Original Articles
Licensee MJS, Universiti Malaya, Malaysia. This article is an open-access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
References
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Primack, R. B., & Corlett, R. (2005). Tropical rain forests: an ecological and biogeographical comparison: Blackwell Pub.
Ricotta, C., Carranza, M. L., & Avena, G. (2002). Computing β-diversity from species-area curves. Basic and Applied Ecology 3(1): 15-18.
Ridley, H. N. (1912). Flora of the Malay Peninsula Vol-1: L. Reeve; London.
Seabloom, E. W. (2007). Compensation and the stability of restored grassland communities. Ecological Applications 17(7): 1876-1885.
Whitmore, T. (1983). Tree Flora of Malaya: a manual for forester. Vol: 1-4. The Forest Research Institute Kepong. Forest Department. Ministry of Agriculture and Lands, Malaysia.
Whitmore, T. C., & Burnham, C. P. (1975). Tropical rain forests of the Far East: Clarendon Press.
Wilson, J. W., Van Rensburg, B. J., Ferguson, J. W. H., & Keith, M. (2008). The relative importance of environment, human activity and space in explaining species richness of South African bird orders. Journal of Biogeography 35(2): 342-352.
Zakaria, R., Mansor, A., Fadzly, N., Rosely, N., & Mansor, M. (2009). Comparison of plant communities at six study plots in Penang forest reserves, Malaysia. Tropical Ecology 50(2): 259.
Attua, E. M., & Pabi, O. (2013). Tree species composition, richness and diversity in the northern forest-savanna ecotone of Ghana. Journal of Applied Biosciences 69: 5437-5448.
Baraloto, C., Molto, Q., Rabaud, S., Hérault, B., Valencia, R., Blanc, L., . . . Thompson, J. (2013). Rapid simultaneous estimation of aboveground biomass and tree diversity across Neotropical forests: a comparison of field inventory methods. Biotropica 45(3): 288-298.
Barbour, M., Burk, J., Pitts, W., Gillians, F., & Schwartz, M. (1999). Terrestrial ecology. In: Chicago, Illinois: Addson Wesley Longman, Inc.
Bheemalingappa, M., Babu, S., Venkata, M., Rao, P., & Ravi, B. (2018). Diversity and Phytosociological Attributes of Trees of Baratang Island, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, India. International Journal of Conservation Science 9(4).
Buzas, M. A., & Hayek, L.-A. C. (1996). Biodiversity resolution: an integrated approach. Biodiversity Letters 40-43.
Castillo-Campos, G., Halffter, G., & Moreno, C. E. (2008). Primary and secondary vegetation patches as contributors to floristic diversity in a tropical deciduous forest landscape. Biodiversity and Conservation 17(7): 1701-1714.
Chao, A., Ma, K., & Hsieh, T. (2016). iNEXT (iNterpolation and EXTrapolation) online: software for interpolation and extrapolation of species diversity. Program and User’s Guide published at http://chao. stat. nthu. edu. tw/wordpress/software_download.
Chittibabu, C., & Parthasarathy, N. (2000). Attenuated tree species diversity in human-impacted tropical evergreen forest sites at Kolli hills, Eastern Ghats, India. Biodiversity & Conservation 9(11): 1493-1519.
Condit, R., Hubbell, S. P., Lafrankie, J. V., Sukumar, R., Manokaran, N., Foster, R. B., & Ashton, P. S. (1996). Species-area and species-individual relationships for tropical trees: a comparison of three 50-ha plots. Journal of Ecology 549-562.
Gentry, A. H., & Dodson, C. (1987). Contribution of nontrees to species richness of a tropical rain forest. Biotropica 19(2): 149-156.
Go, R., Eng, K. H., Mustafa, M., Abdullah, J. O., Naruddin, A. A., Lee, N. S., . . . Choi, K. (2011). An assessment of orchids’ diversity in Penang Hill, Penang, Malaysia after 115 years. Biodiversity and Conservation 20(10): 2263-2272.
Gupta, S., & Prasad, P. (2013). Analysis of tree diversity patterns in the tropical evergreen and moist deciduous forests of the Middle Andaman Islands, India. Biodiversity Management & Forestry 2(3).
Hammer, Ø., Harper, D. A., & Ryan, P. D. (2001). PAST: paleontological statistics software package for education and data analysis. Palaeontologia electronica 4(1): 9.
Hansen, J., Kharecha, P., Sato, M., Masson-Delmotte, V., Ackerman, F., Beerling, D. J., . . . Parmesan, C. (2013). Assessing “dangerous climate change”: required reduction of carbon emissions to protect young people, future generations and nature. PLoS One 8(12): e81648.
Ho, C. C., Newbery, D. M., & Poore, M. (1987). Forest composition and inferred dynamics in Jengka Forest Reserve, Malaysia. Journal of tropical Ecology 3(1): 25-56.
Kacholi, D. S. (2014). Edge-interior disparities in tree species and structural composition of the Kilengwe forest in Morogoro region, Tanzania. ISRN Biodiversity.
Mwavu, E. N., & Witkowski, E. T. (2015). Woody Species Alpha‐diversity and Species Abundance Distributions in an African Semi‐deciduous Tropical Rain Forest. Biotropica 47(4): 424-434.
Nieder, J., Engwald, S., Klawun, M., & Barthlott, W. (2000). Spatial distribution of vascular epiphytes (including Hemiepiphytes) in a Lowland Amazonian Rain Forest (Surumoni Crane Plot) of Southern Venezuela 1. Biotropica 32(3): 385-396.
Pärtel, M., Laanisto, L., & Zobel, M. (2007). Contrasting plant productivity–diversity relationships across latitude: the role of evolutionary history. Ecology 88(5): 1091-1097.
Parthasarathy, N. (1999). Tree diversity and distribution in undisturbed and human-impacted sites of tropical wet evergreen forest in southern Western Ghats, India. Biodiversity & Conservation 8(10): 1365-1381.
Phillips, O. L., Hall, P., Gentry, A. H., Sawyer, S., & Vasquez, R. (1994). Dynamics and species richness of tropical rain forests. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 91(7): 2805-2809.
Pitman, N. C., Terborgh, J. W., Silman, M. R., Núñez V, P., Neill, D. A., Cerón, C. E., . . . Aulestia, M. (2001). Dominance and distribution of tree species in upper Amazonian terra firme forests. Ecology 82(8): 2101-2117.
Primack, R. B., & Corlett, R. (2005). Tropical rain forests: an ecological and biogeographical comparison: Blackwell Pub.
Ricotta, C., Carranza, M. L., & Avena, G. (2002). Computing β-diversity from species-area curves. Basic and Applied Ecology 3(1): 15-18.
Ridley, H. N. (1912). Flora of the Malay Peninsula Vol-1: L. Reeve; London.
Seabloom, E. W. (2007). Compensation and the stability of restored grassland communities. Ecological Applications 17(7): 1876-1885.
Whitmore, T. (1983). Tree Flora of Malaya: a manual for forester. Vol: 1-4. The Forest Research Institute Kepong. Forest Department. Ministry of Agriculture and Lands, Malaysia.
Whitmore, T. C., & Burnham, C. P. (1975). Tropical rain forests of the Far East: Clarendon Press.
Wilson, J. W., Van Rensburg, B. J., Ferguson, J. W. H., & Keith, M. (2008). The relative importance of environment, human activity and space in explaining species richness of South African bird orders. Journal of Biogeography 35(2): 342-352.
Zakaria, R., Mansor, A., Fadzly, N., Rosely, N., & Mansor, M. (2009). Comparison of plant communities at six study plots in Penang forest reserves, Malaysia. Tropical Ecology 50(2): 259.