Silva Fennica : regular issues : 43(5) : sa435739.htm
Community-level physiological profiling in monitoring rehabilitative effects of Acacia auriculiformis plantation on degraded land in Sakaerat, Thailand
Silva Fennica 43(5): 739–754
This study was conducted to investigate the rehabilitative effects of planting Acacia auriculiformis trees on degraded land by observing variations in soil bacterial community profiles provided by community-level physiological profiling. Soil bacterial and physicochemical comparisons between an original evergreen forest and the Acacia plantation plot, established on an area severely degraded as a result of deforestation, showed that most soil characteristics were rehabilitated 18 to 19 years after the plantation of Acacia according to single variables, Shannon and Simpson diversity indices based on the community-level physiological profiles, principal component analysis and redundancy analysis. However, a more strict statistical comparison, discriminant analysis, completely discriminated between the Acacia plantation and the evergreen forest soils when the community-level physiological profiles were compared. Thus, the Acacia plantation soil was shown to still be in the process to full recovery. Here, we discuss the relevance of planting A. auriculiformis in land rehabilitation schemes in savanna regions.
Keywords
Acacia auriculiformis, community-level physiological profile, land degradation and rehabilitation, multivariate analysis, soil bacterial community
Addresses
AFE Building, School of Environment, Resources and Development, Asian Institute of Technology, Pathumthani 12120, Thailand. E-mail roird@aeiou.pt
Received 4 August 2008 Revised 25 May 2009 Accepted 3 September 2009
ISSN 0037-5330