Abstract booklet - gtö – Society for Tropical Ecology

182 SCIENTIFIC POSTER SESSION | FOYERSCIENTIFIC POSTER SESSION | FOYER183Topic: The Andean biodiversity hotspot and its futureCULTURAL KEY SPECIES FOR BIOCULTURAL CONSERVATION IN THEBOLIVIAN ANDESCOLLECTION AND USE OF FIELD SPECTRAL DATA FOR LAND COVERCHANGE DETECTION IN A TROPICAL MOUNTAIN FORESTGiulia Curatola 1Regine Brandt 1 , Stephan Rist 2 , Isabell Hensen 11University of Marburg, Marburg, DE, gicufe@gmail.comWEDNESDAY | FOYER1Inst. Geobotany MLU Halle, Halle (Saale), DE, regine.brandt@botanik.uni-halle.de,2Centre for Development and Environment (CDE), Bern, CHIn biocultural conservation, the concept of Cultural Key Species (CKS) provides usefulapproaches for dialogues between local actors and ecologists aiming at balancedintegration of use and conservation. The concept allows the human-environmentalrelationships to be understood and shows how cultural and biological diversity arelinked. It supports the assessment of current patterns of land and resource use, whichis of fundamental importance in agropastoral landscapes of the Bolivian Andes. CKSare characterized by high use values and have crucial socioeconomic and culturalroles. Depending on environmental and societal contexts, CKS vary according tohuman needs and their availabilities. Therefore, our case study focussed on woodyspecies and addressed the following questions: Which are CKS of the area? Are CKSamong the most abundant species? Which species’ traits favour high use values ofCKS?The study was carried out in the peasants’ community Tres Cruces (2800-3800 m a.s.l.)in Cochabamba, Bolivia. For data collection, vegetation surveys (n=42) and semistructuredinterviews (individual n=10, group n=3, family n=9, transect walk n=2)were combined. For each species, their uses were grouped into 11 use categories. Usevalues (Relative Importance [RI]) were assessed and “apparency” (Importance Value[IV]) was estimated for each species using data of floristic composition. Data wereanalyzed using correlation and principal components analyses (PCA).A total of 58 woody species were identified. The shrubby Baccharis dracunculifolia DC.and Cestrum parqui L’Hér were of highest importance (IV). The trees Schinus molle L. andEucalyptus globulus Labill. were among the most useful (RI) species and thus consideredas CKS within the local context. From an ecological perspective, exotic Eucalyptus ssp.are controversial, but might be assessed within their interspecific relationships due totheir negative but also positive effects on native threatened species (e.g. Polylepis ssp.).Shown by correlation analysis, useful species were also among the most abundantplants. Availability of timber was determined by PCA as most important species’ traitfor high use values, which is in line with lacking timber and fuel wood accessibilityin the area. Similarly, species’ abundance was assessed to be crucial for determiningCKS. In general, shrubs had lower use values than trees, but were shown to be moreapparent and capable of being integrated into agropastoral land use.Topic: The Andean biodiversity hotspot and its futureThe analysis of land use change of the past decades is fundamental for adeeper understanding of the natural and anthropogenic landscape dynamicsin the southern Ecuador’s tropical mountain forest ecosystem. Not only toclarify the past and present situation but also to estimate the future landscapedevelopment through predictive models. This information will be finally apowerful basis for the elaboration of sustainable land use options.A time period of 35 years, from 1975 until 2010, will be studied usingmultitemporal satellite data. Particular attention will be dedicated to thespatial distribution of the Bracken fern (Pteridium arachnoideum and Pteridiumcaudatum) and to the deforestation process.Preprocessing of individual satellite scenes is a fundamental step to preparethe images for information extraction. Accurate topographic and atmosphericcorrections are essential to acquire precise ground surface reflectances. For thisreason, a new physically based atmospheric and topographic program (AtToCor)was developed within the working group. After applying the correctionalgorithms using the AtToCor program and IDRISI Andes, visual comparisonof the resulting images were made. The combination of the Sandmeier & Ittenalgorithm and the Teillet.et al. c-correction yielded the best results.For the classification phase, two different methods are going to be compared.Training sites extracted from the image are used in the first approach to createthe land cover classes. However, this technique produces good results only ifexpert knowledge of the landscape characteristics is accessible. Therefore,it is extremely difficult to identify sampling sites in the old images where noland cover information is available. Following this method, it was not possibleto classify the Bracken fern in the 1987 image. However, the forest patternwas clearly observable because it was visually recognizable. Further researchusing field spectral data is being performed to improve individual imageclassifications, to allow multitemporal spectral data comparison and to detectland use change in the study area.Wednesday WEDNESDAY 16:00 | FOYER | FoyergtöSociety for Tropical Ecology | Gesellschaft für Tropenökologie e.V. Status and future of tropical biodiversity | Frankfurt, 21 - 24 February 2011gtö