Publication Type:
ThesisSource:
Engenharia Florestal, Universidade Federal do Paraná, Volume Doctoral, Curitiba, Brazil, p.266 (2007)URL:
http://www.floresta.ufpr.br/pos-graduacao/defesas/pdf_dr/2007/t218_0266-D.pdfAbstract:
This work aimed to evaluate the factors related to the productivity, sustainability and environmental impacts of the black wattle plantation in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. The studies made about those plantations analyzed the utilization of the genetically improved seeds, the soil attributes influence, the P and K fertilization profit, the uptake, cycling and exportation of nutrients, the biomass production and partition, the black wattle invasion in the grassland area and riparian forest, the forest succession and the understorey herbaceous vegetation of the black wattle plantation. The timber production at the age of five years increased in 9.1 m3/ha through the seed improvement adoption that represented a net profit of R$ 180.00 per ha; however those increments depended on the utilization of suitable silvicultural practices. The gummosis (Phytophthora sp.) was observed in 33.9% of the dead trees during the period from three to five years and reduced in 9.0% the growth of attacked plants. The optimal economic rotation defined by the net present worth, considering an infinite horizon, was at the age of four years for the land owner and at the age of six years for the renters. The P, K and organic matter on the soil had positive effects on the black wattle growth. Similarly, it was found the response to the P and K fertilization, with a medium increase of 36.2% in the timber volume, and the P also promoted the greatest increments and the response to the K were great on the optimal dose of the P. The greatest foliage efficiency for the biomass production and the maximum timber productivity occurred at the age of five years. At the age of seven years the trunk represented around 80% of the aboveground biomass and stored a greater quantity of P,K, Ca and Mg. The N and S accumulation was greater in the crown trees compartments. The nutrients cycling rate via litter during de rotation of seven years varied from 25.3 to 59.6% and after the age of four years they represented more then 60% of the nutrients absorbed by the plants. The Ca and K were the nutrients exported in a greater quantity by the forest harvest. The best efficiency of the nutrients to the trunk biomass production and the least nutrients exportation per biomass unit harvested occurred when the plantations were six and seven years old. The black wattle was able to invade only disturbed grassland area with total exposure of the soil, for this reason it must be considered as a causal invasive plant. The native vegetation recomposition of those areas provoked mortality of a greater number of invasive plants. In the other hand, the black wattle does not become an invasive plant in the riparian forest and when planted in those areas proportioned an abundant and diversified succession in its understorey. The black wattle plantation in grassland area reduced part of the floristic diversity of the herbaceous vegetation and propitiated the typical species settlement in the understorey forests, however they did not affected the site environmental resilience.