The predominant role of soil in determining species composition of fern communities in subtropical coastal forest ecosystems

By

Carmes, Amanda Angélica
Dechoum, Michele de Sá
Fiaschi, Pedro

Type

Article

Date of Publication

2019-12-18

Original Publication

Neotropical Biology and Conservation

Volume

14

Series / Issue

Issue: 4

Pages

559--575

Subjects

Abiotic factors , Brasil , Brazil , Canopy cover , cobertura do dossel , diversidade , diversity , dominance , dominância , estrutura da vegetação , Fatores Abióticos , nutrient richness , riqueza de nutrientes , vegetation structure

Contributed by

Pensoft Publishers

Language

English

Published by

Brazil Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos

Identifiers

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/neotropical.14.e49028

 

Abstract

Ferns are an important component in the understorey of tropical forests and their distribution is influenced by several biotic and abiotic factors. At a regional scale, soil characteristics and canopy openness play an important role in fern species composition and richness, as well as in the abundance of individuals. Our objective was to compare the influence of edaphic conditions and vegetation structure on the abundance and distribution of fern communities in Atlantic forest andrestingaforest. Our hypotheses were that fern species richness and diversity are higher in Atlantic forest than inrestingadue to limiting conditions in this habitat and the composition of fern species in Atlantic forest differs fromrestinga, especially due to differences in edaphic conditions. A principal coordinates analysis was applied to ordinate sampling units in relation to the environmental variables and a permutational multivariate analysis of variance was used to test that environmental variables did not differ between the two vegetation types. Species richness was compared using rarefaction curves. The influence of abiotic variables in species composition and abundance was verified using canonical correspondence analysis. No differences were observed in species richness, diversity or dominance between vegetation types, although abundance was higher inrestinga. Fern communities respond to edaphic conditions and vegetation structure variations between vegetation types, the soil playing a major role. A greater variety of habitats resulting from differences in soil drainage inrestingafacilitates the co-existence of species with different ecological tolerance, increasing local diversity and compensating for limiting conditions inrestinga.