Ecological Impact of Merremia peltata (L.) Merrill Invasion on Plant Diversity at Bukit Barisan Selatan National Park
Bukit Barisan Selatan National Park (BBSNP) is the third largest protected area in Sumatra.Â Unfortunately, the area is invaded by Merremia peltata which occupiedÂ aboutÂ 7 000 ha. The aims of this study was to determine the ecological impacts ofÂ M. peltata on plant biodiversity at BBSNP. Three locations were selected for vegetation analysis and M.peltata invasion assessment on the vegetation composition in BBSNP, i.e. the primary forest representing undisturbed area, secondary forest representing burned area, and invaded forest representing forest invaded by M. peltata. Three line transectsÂ were constructed at each locations along1 km, andÂ the nested sampling plots were constructed every 100 m with the following quadrants : 20 m x 20 m for trees, 10 mÂ x 10 m for poles, 5 mÂ x 5 m for sapling, and 2 m x 2 m for seedling. The data collected were invasions of M. peltata, trees species, and diameter of the trees.Â Invaded forest has lower diversity index (1.90)Â than the other two. This caused by the invasion of M. peltata as the percentage of coverage in the invaded forest reached 44% compared to secondary and the primary forest which wereÂ 27.11% and 1.00%. It is evidenced by the correlation between the percentage of coverage M. peltata and diversity index (-0.988).
How to Cite
Authors who publish with this journal agree with the following terms:
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication, with the work 1 year after publication simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons attribution-noncommerical-noderivates 4.0 International License that allows others to share, copy and redistribute the work in any medium or format, but only where the use is for non-commercial purposes and an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal is mentioned.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).