How Do You Rate This Publication?       

Title:	Relations Between Denisty of Rhododendron Thickets and Diversity of Riparian Forests
Author(s):	Baker, T.T.; van Lear, David H.
Date:	1998
Source:	Forest Ecology and Management 109 (1998) 21-32
Description:	Rosebay rhododendron (Rhododendron maximum L.) is increasing its range and abundance in understories of southern Appalachian forests, reducing species richness, and altering patterns of succession. This study characterized the density andbiomass attributes of R. maximum thicket sand examined their effects on plant species richness, percentcover, andregeneration patterns within a southern Appalachian riparian ecosystem. R. maximum reached densities exceeding 17,000 stems ha-1 with biomass reaching 34 Mg ha-1. Species richness and percent cover in the regeneration layer were inversely related to R. maximum thicket density in both Spring and Fall samplings. On average, 6 plant species were found on plots with high R. maximum stem density as compared to 26 species found on plots with lower stem density. The regeneration layer was dominated by R. maximum with only low numbers of tree species present. Both woody and herbaceous species regenerated poorly under the dense canopy of these thickets. Based on the age of cut stems, R. maximum became increasingly dominant in the understory of Wine Spring Creek over the last three decades. Its proliferation is altering the richness of riparian forests and changing historical patterns of community succession.
	View and Print this Publication (235 KB)
Pristine Version:	An uncaptured or "pristine" version of this publication is available. It has not been subjected to OCR (Optical Character Recognition) and therefore does not have any errors in the text. However it is a larger file size and some people may experience long download times. The "pristine" version of this publication is available here: View and Print the PRISTINE copy of this Publication (2.9 MB)
Publication Notes:	We recommend that you also print this page and attach it to the printout of the article, to retain the full citation information. This article was written and prepared by U.S. Government employees on official time, and is therefore in the public domain. Our on-line publications are scanned and captured using Adobe Acrobat. During the capture process some typographical errors may occur. Please contact the SRS Webmaster, srswebmaster@fs.fed.us if you notice any errors which make this publication unuseable.
	Get the latest version of the Adobe Acrobat reader or Acrobat Reader for Windows with Search and Accessibility