Patricia Viviana Zelaya
The Dry Chaco Forest (DCF) in Argentina currently faces alarming deforestation rates due to the advance of the agricultural frontier. DCF is one of the less protected ecosystems and forest fragments are in risks due to their increasing degradation and isolation in the landscape. We aim to implement and monitoring restoration methods to recover the structure and functions of the DCF by:
(1) Settling the ecological baseline about ecosystem structure and functions of the DCF. Vegetation structure and composition, natural regeneration potential, soil condition and litterfall production will be evaluated.
(2) Evaluating perceptions of local people on the DCF through several workshops, the ways they relate with and use the forest resources will be evaluated.
(3) Define and implement initial restoration actions for the DCF collectively with the local people.
(4) Installing a nursery for species propagation.
(5) A monitoring protocol will be implemented throughout the execution of this project.
During the last three decades, soybeans crops extension has expanded without precedents in Argentina and particularly in this province, where the area planted since 1988 showed a 7-fold increasing, ranking among the five main producing provinces. DCF was reduced to isolated fragments of different shapes and sizes, surrounded by an agricultural matrix. Small fragments (<0.10 ha) present different levels of degradation as a consequence of historical and current use made by local communities, such as the extraction of large individuals of the main tree species, extraction of other species for firewood and charcoal, livestock introduction (i.e. goats, cows), hunting, and also by the changes brought by the advance of agriculture (e.g., edge effects, exotic and invasive species, agrochemical presence). Local rural people such as the one that currently use the fragment are constituted by no more than 20 families. In this project we will:
Objective.1:
Considering two forest fragments: The first fragment (1000 ha) is within a private land that was not altered since the 60´s (our reference site). A second fragment (100 ha), used by local rural people will constitute our degraded site. Both fragments will be characterized according to: (i) soil conditions (≈50 cm), (ii) tree species richness and diversity, (iii) tree community characteristics (i.e. height, DBH, basal area and natural regeneration potential) and (iv) presence of invasive species. For forest functions: litterfall production and presence of pollinator species and their relationships with mellifluous species.
Objective. 2:
Evaluate perceptions of local people on the DCF. We will organize five workshops across the project, which will also help to understand and valuate ecological dependence of local people on forest resources and services. Local people are common extractors of forest resources, thus we will train them to promote a more sustainable use of forest resources. A final workshop will summarize and show main results and lessons about the whole process, making auto-critics and discussing suggestions of the local people for future.
Objective 3:
Define and implement initial restoration actions collectively with the local people. Within each forest fragment we will establish 50×50m-experimental restoration plots- where the disturbance factors will be eliminated (e.g. livestock), and evaluate seedling performance throughout the first and second year of the project.
Nursery construction. With the collaboration and involvement of local people a nursery will be installed to house all seedlings until they have the size needed to be introduced in the restoration plots.