Moving to healthier landscapes: Forest restoration decreases the abundance of Hantavirus reservoir rodents in tropical forests

Context: Gold mining is the most destructive activity in the natural forests of the Madre de Dios region in the southeastern Peruvian Amazon. Understanding the natural regeneration process of these degraded areas is necessary to develop forest restoration projects in such conditions.Aims: We aimed to evaluate forest recovery and identify the successional and structure patterns of vegetation governing natural regeneration over time.Methods: Structure, composition, richness, diversity, and successional status were evaluated in abandoned artisanal gold mine areas in Madre de Dios, southeastern Peru. Vegetation data were recorded in 61 plots of 250 m2 established in five sites varying from 1 to 19 years of abandonment. Vegetation in abandoned areas was compared with six undisturbed forests evaluated in previous inventories.Results: In the mining lands, tree density and basal area recovered quickly, while species richness and composition were slow. Forest recovery is an initial stage of transition from pioneer to early secondary species until at least 19 years after abandonment. The most abundant and frequent species were the fast-growing species Ochroma pyramidale and Cecropia engleriana. These species could be considered potential candidates to promote restoration plans. Pioneer species represented 63% of the number of species in plots of 1–4 years, 57% in plots of 5–7 years, and 50% in plots of 8–19 years. Early and late secondary species represented 34 and 16%, respectively, of the number of species in plots of 8–19 years. Abandoned mining and reference plots present less than 5% of species in common.Conclusion: Our results highlight a slow natural regeneration process in areas for up to 19 years after gold mining. Species from different successional statuses were identified as potential candidates for recovering vegetation in such areas. Our findings may have important implications for further research focusing on the ecological restoration in tropical forests severely degraded by gold mining.

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How can molecular ecology contribute to forest restoration?

Journal of Biotechnology and Biodiversity ◽

10.20873/jbb.uft.cemaf.v4n4.siqueira ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 4 (4) ◽

pp. 316-321

Author(s):

Marcos Vinicius Bohrer Monteiro Siqueira ◽

Patricia Sanae Sujii ◽

Miklos Bajay ◽

Carolina Grando ◽

Kaiser Schwarcz ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Tropical Forests ◽

Forest Restoration ◽

Population Studies ◽

Molecular Ecology ◽

Point Of View ◽

Molecular Techniques ◽

Forest Recovery ◽

Main Ideas ◽

New Strategies

The advance of scientific knowledge in various areas of molecular ecology has allowed the adoption of new strategies, particularly in forest restoration. The fusion of multidisciplinary areas and the implementation of management methodologies in order to get better results in forest restoration are current realities. In order to review the main ideas about the role of molecular techniques in the service of ecology restoration, this paper outlines how forest recovery can benefit from genetic and genomic plant population studies. The next challenges in conservation genetics can be brought by the quest for more efficient forest restorations from the point of view of biodiversity as well as the ecological ynamics as a whole. It is believed that in the coming years we will observe integrated strategies in molecular ecology with specific methodologies for restoration in tropical forests.

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Traditional medicinal knowledge of tropical trees and its value for restoration of tropical forests

Botanical Sciences ◽

10.17129/botsci.2122 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 97 (3) ◽

pp. 336

Author(s):

Juana García-Flores ◽

Mario González-Espinosa ◽

Roberto Lindig-Cisneros ◽

Alejandro Casas

Keyword(s):

Tropical Forests ◽

Tree Species ◽

Forest Restoration ◽

Gliricidia Sepium ◽

Tropical Species ◽

Structured Interviews ◽

Fuel Wood ◽

Plant Resources ◽

Study Region ◽

Medicinal Tree

Background. Traditional medicinal knowledge (TMK) accounts for attending nearly 80% of the worldwide needs of health. The highest diversity of medicinal plants includes tropical species and, therefore, TMK may be useful in guiding efforts to recovering tropical biodiversity and ecosystems.Questions. Can TMK become a strategy to be used in identifying medicinal tree species, with bothcultural and ecological importance, that should be considered in tropical forest restoration actions?Study site and dates. The study was conducted during 2015 in four communities of the Sierra region of southern Tabasco, Mexico.Methods. We obtained from the literature a checklist of medicinal trees native to the study region. We conducted semi-structured interviews and participatory workshops in each community; we obtained ethnobotanical data about the most common illnesses and the most important plant species used for attending them. We identified priority species for forest restoration. Indexes of medicinal knowledge (TMK), knowledge richness (IKR) and cultural significance (ICS) were calculated.Results. We recorded a total of 43 tree species. Adult and elder women showed the highest TMK. The main illnesses are gastrointestinal (93-97%), treated with 13 species, and those related with pain and fever (67-97%), treated with 16 species. On average, the IKR was less than 50% of all the species recorded. The highest values of ICS were for Gliricidia sepium, Bursera simaruba, and Piper auritum, whereas Brosimum alicastrum, Ceiba pentandra and Castilla elástica had the lowest values; however, the latter were the species considered with highest priority for forest restoration actions.Conclusions. TMK may be a useful criteria for identifying species to be used in restoring tropical forests, but it should be complemented with other use values of the plant resources based such as food, fuel, wood, among others.

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Active restoration accelerates the carbon recovery of human-modified tropical forests

Science ◽

10.1126/science.aay4490 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 369 (6505) ◽

pp. 838-841 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Christopher D. Philipson ◽

Mark E. J. Cutler ◽

Philip G. Brodrick ◽

Gregory P. Asner ◽

Doreen S. Boyd ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Tropical Forests ◽

Forest Restoration ◽

Human Impacts ◽

Aboveground Carbon Density ◽

Paris Climate Agreement ◽

Tropical Forest Restoration ◽

Modal Values ◽

Carbon Losses ◽

Carbon Prices

More than half of all tropical forests are degraded by human impacts, leaving them threatened with conversion to agricultural plantations and risking substantial biodiversity and carbon losses. Restoration could accelerate recovery of aboveground carbon density (ACD), but adoption of restoration is constrained by cost and uncertainties over effectiveness. We report a long-term comparison of ACD recovery rates between naturally regenerating and actively restored logged tropical forests. Restoration enhanced decadal ACD recovery by more than 50%, from 2.9 to 4.4 megagrams per hectare per year. This magnitude of response, coupled with modal values of restoration costs globally, would require higher carbon prices to justify investment in restoration. However, carbon prices required to fulfill the 2016 Paris climate agreement [$40 to $80 (USD) per tonne carbon dioxide equivalent] would provide an economic justification for tropical forest restoration.

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Maximizing the value of forest restoration for tropical mammals by detecting three-dimensional habitat associations

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ◽

10.1073/pnas.2001823117 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 117 (42) ◽

pp. 26254-26262

Author(s):

Nicolas J. Deere ◽

Gurutzeta Guillera-Arroita ◽

Tom Swinfield ◽

David T. Milodowski ◽

David A. Coomes ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Tropical Forests ◽

Forest Structure ◽

Forest Restoration ◽

Three Dimensional ◽

Habitat Associations ◽

Vertical Column ◽

Area Index ◽

Maximum Benefit ◽

Plant Area Index ◽

Plant Area

Tropical forest ecosystems are facing unprecedented levels of degradation, severely compromising habitat suitability for wildlife. Despite the fundamental role biodiversity plays in forest regeneration, identifying and prioritizing degraded forests for restoration or conservation, based on their wildlife value, remains a significant challenge. Efforts to characterize habitat selection are also weakened by simple classifications of human-modified tropical forests as intact vs. degraded, which ignore the influence that three-dimensional (3D) forest structure may have on species distributions. Here, we develop a framework to identify conservation and restoration opportunities across logged forests in Borneo. We couple high-resolution airborne light detection and ranging (LiDAR) and camera trap data to characterize the response of a tropical mammal community to changes in 3D forest structure across a degradation gradient. Mammals were most responsive to covariates that accounted explicitly for the vertical and horizontal characteristics of the forest and actively selected structurally complex environments comprising tall canopies, increased plant area index throughout the vertical column, and the availability of a greater diversity of niches. We show that mammals are sensitive to structural simplification through disturbance, emphasizing the importance of maintaining and enhancing structurally intact forests. By calculating occurrence thresholds of species in response to forest structural change, we identify areas of degraded forest that would provide maximum benefit for multiple high-conservation value species if restored. The study demonstrates the advantages of using LiDAR to map forest structure, rather than relying on overly simplistic classifications of human-modified tropical forests, for prioritizing regions for restoration.

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Payment for water-ecosystem services monitoring in Brazil

Ambiente e Agua - An Interdisciplinary Journal of Applied Science ◽

10.4136/ambi-agua.2684 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 16 (4) ◽

pp. 1

Author(s):

Ana Paula Morais de Lima ◽

Rachel Bardy Prado ◽

Agnieszka Ewa Latawiec

Keyword(s):

Ecosystem Services ◽

Tropical Forests ◽

Forest Restoration ◽

Current Data ◽

Institutional Arrangements ◽

Case Study Approach ◽

Study Approach ◽

Water Ecosystem ◽

Water Provision

The reduction of tropical forests has generated a loss of ecosystem services across the globe. In Brazil, essential biomes related to water provision (such as the Atlantic Forest and Savanna) have been degraded, compromising water-ecosystem services. Payment for water-ecosystem services (water PES) has been implemented as a tool to stimulate changes in the use and management of these areas. Many water PES projects have emerged in Brazil using forest restoration, aiming to improve water ecosystem services. In this context, this study identified the types of monitoring carried out in Brazilian water PES projects, to include their main characteristics and gaps. Five Brazilian projects were selected for analysis as case studies. Interviews were then conducted with stakeholders to get current data on their monitoring practices. The data from the literature review, case study approach, and interviews were analyzed from the perspective of monitoring guides recommendations. Different aspects were analyzed, such as objectives, institutional arrangements, type of monitoring, indicators, and frequency of monitoring. The study indicates that there is a lack of standardized methods, making it difficult to specify the results of the implemented actions. The central gap is related to benefit monitoring. It is necessary to establish a holistic monitoring system, dealing with the ecosystem as a complex socio-ecological system. Some perspectives to solve the problems were proposed. The results of this work may help not only improve the current and future PES schemes in Brazil but also in other countries, especially developing ones, where vulnerable populations depend upon them.

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Integrating Density into Dispersal and Establishment Limitation Equations in Tropical Forests

Forests ◽

10.3390/f9090570 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 9 (9) ◽

pp. 570 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Marinés de la Peña-Domene ◽

Cristina Martínez-Garza

Keyword(s):

Tropical Forests ◽

Seedling Establishment ◽

Forest Restoration ◽

Agricultural Landscape ◽

Secondary Forest ◽

Biosphere Reserve ◽

Dispersal Limitation ◽

Plant Recruitment ◽

Old Growth Forest ◽

High Dispersal

Plant recruitment in tropical forests reflects the chance that seeds arrive at a site resulting in seedling establishment. To inform tropical forest restoration, we ask how seed and seedling densities differentially affect dispersal and establishment limitation in successional habitats in a tropical agricultural landscape. Methods: In Los Tuxtlas Biosphere Reserve, we calculated indices of dispersal and establishment limitation using data on seed rain and seedling establishment in old-growth forest, secondary forest, and fenced pasture. We present an index that considers variations in dispersal- and establishment-limitation including density-weighted calculations. Results: There were greater dispersal and establishment limitations in pasture than in forests. Substantial differences in both dispersal and establishment limitation occurred among the 33 species for which seed and seedling data were available. Only 5% of all species had mid to low limitation in both dispersal and establishment. In contrast, 60% of all species showed high dispersal and establishment limitation. Plant recruitment in pastures is impeded by low seed arrival, given that 77% of the recorded species showed extremely high dispersal limitation (>90%). Conclusions: The low capacity of most species to arrive, seeds to germinate and seedlings to establish in pastures slow down succession back to forest.

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Distribution and abundance of nearctic–neotropical songbird migrants in a forest restoration site in southern Costa Rica

Journal of Tropical Ecology ◽

10.1017/s0266467408005415 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 24 (6) ◽

pp. 685-688 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

J. Leighton Reid ◽

J. Berton C. Harris ◽

Laura J. Martin ◽

Jacob R. Barnett ◽

Rakan A. Zahawi

Keyword(s):

Central America ◽

Tropical Forests ◽

Forest Restoration ◽

Ecological Role ◽

Migrant Populations ◽

Ecological Relationships ◽

Migratory Songbirds ◽

America South ◽

The Caribbean

Many ecological relationships that are inherently reciprocal are often studied from one perspective only (Agrawal et al. 2007). One example is the interaction between tropical forests and nearctic-neotropical migratory songbirds (hereafter migrants). Several studies have determined that some migrant populations are limited by conditions at their tropical wintering grounds in Central America, South America and the Caribbean (Marra et al. 1998, Mills 2006); however, the ecological role of migrants in these tropical forests is poorly understood.

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ON THE USE OF SHORTWAVE INFRARED FOR TREE SPECIES DISCRIMINATION IN TROPICAL SEMIDECIDUOUS FOREST

ISPRS - International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences ◽

10.5194/isprsarchives-xl-3-w3-473-2015 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol XL-3/W3 ◽

pp. 473-476 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

M. P. Ferreira ◽

M. Zortea ◽

D. C. Zanotta ◽

J. B. Féret ◽

Y. E. Shimabukuro ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Tropical Forests ◽

Tree Species ◽

Forest Restoration ◽

Hyperspectral Data ◽

Support Vector ◽

Species Discrimination ◽

Semideciduous Forest ◽

Linear Discriminant ◽

Average Accuracy ◽

Shortwave Infrared

Tree species mapping in tropical forests provides valuable insights for forest managers. Keystone species can be located for collection of seeds for forest restoration, reducing fieldwork costs. However, mapping of tree species in tropical forests using remote sensing data is a challenge due to high floristic and spectral diversity. Little is known about the use of different spectral regions as most of studies performed so far used visible/near-infrared (390-1000 nm) features. In this paper we show the contribution of shortwave infrared (SWIR, 1045-2395 nm) for tree species discrimination in a tropical semideciduous forest. Using high-resolution hyperspectral data we also simulated WorldView-3 (WV-3) multispectral bands for classification purposes. Three machine learning methods were tested to discriminate species at the pixel-level: Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA), Support Vector Machines with Linear (L-SVM) and Radial Basis Function (RBF-SVM) kernels, and Random Forest (RF). Experiments were performed using all and selected features from the VNIR individually and combined with SWIR. Feature selection was applied to evaluate the effects of dimensionality reduction and identify potential wavelengths that may optimize species discrimination. Using VNIR hyperspectral bands, RBF-SVM achieved the highest average accuracy (77.4%). Inclusion of the SWIR increased accuracy to 85% with LDA. The same pattern was also observed when WV-3 simulated channels were used to classify the species. The VNIR bands provided and accuracy of 64.2% for LDA, which was increased to 79.8 % using the new SWIR bands that are operationally available in this platform. Results show that incorporating SWIR bands increased significantly average accuracy for both the hyperspectral data and WorldView-3 simulated bands.

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Biogeographic and Anthropogenic Effects on Asian Elephants in Tropical Forests of Sumatra, Indonesia

Practice, Progress, and Proficiency in Sustainability - Handbook of Research on the Conservation and Restoration of Tropical Dry Forests ◽

10.4018/978-1-7998-0014-9.ch008 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 140-170

Author(s):

David M. Augeri

Keyword(s):

Tropical Forests ◽

Detection Probability ◽

Forest Restoration ◽

Habitat Type ◽

Primary Forest ◽

Asian Elephants ◽

Factors Affecting ◽

Distance Model ◽

Best Fitting ◽

Conservation Plans

DISTANCE protocols and MIKE Survey Standards were used in the field to determine Critically Endangered (CR) (A2c) Sumatran elephant (Elephas maximus sumatranus) occupancy, density and abundance in Gunung Leuser National Park (GLNP). Forest and habitat type, age, character, and integrity were the most significant factors affecting elephant occupancy. Principal forage types relative to elephant activity were palms and lianas, which dominated significantly in undisturbed primary forest. DISTANCE model density D=0.167 elephants/km-2 (95% CI=0.106–0.262), best-fitting occupancy Ψ=0.6321 (SE±0.0010) and detection probability p=0.6225 (SE±0.0001) estimates combined yielded N=407 elephants (95% CI: 258–638) in GLNP. The most parsimonious occupancy model estimated N=392.82 elephants (SE:±30.65; 95% CI: 332.78-452.95) in GLNP. Forest restoration, ecosystem protections, and conservation plans for Asian elephants, biodiversity, and forests are suggested in this study.

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