Floral and Faunal Composition, Phenology, and Fire in the Aripo Savannas Scientific Reserve, Trinidad, West Indies
File(s)
Date
1988-03Author
Schwab, Sharon I.
Publisher
University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, College of Natural Resources
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
This study was designed to update and expand our
knowledge of the proposed Aripo Savannas Scientific Reserve.
The information provided by this study is requisite for any
management plan which encourages preservation of the area's
native plant and animal communities.
The thesis itself is divided into five parts: four
chapters and appendices. The first two chapters are
entitled: "Composition and phenology of open savanna
vegetation in the Aripo Savannas Scientific Reserve,
Trinidad, W.I." and "Vegetation response to arson fires in
the Aripo Savannas Scientific Reserve, Trinidad, W.I."
Chapters three and four are area floral and faunal
checklists respectively.
The Aripo Savanna's importance as a unique natural
place in Trinidad was recognized well over 100 years ago.
Its beauty and intrigue for botanists, naturalists,
zoologists, and others has been referred to in the classic
literature and yet, ten years since its recommendation for
legal protection, it remains unprotected and abused by an
encroaching population. Parcels in the Aripo Savannas have
been burned, logged, planted, grazed, poached, cleared, and
even used as a site for military exercises.
Fortunately, the area has demonstrated its resilience;
poor soils have deterred farming, drought-adapted plants
recover from moderate burning, and some animals even hide in
the mud for months of the year to avoid changes caused by
seasonal fluctuations. Yet despite its resilience, portions
of Aripo Savannas are showing signs of community instability
and change. Unless the area is officially protected and the
laws that are designated to protect it are enforced, the
Aripo Savannas will be destroyed like the O'Meara, Piarco,
and other savannas which once shared a similar biota.
This area offers the public an opportunity to protect a
natural heritage, to conduct research related to its natural
history, and encourage environmental and natural science
education centering on a unique ecosystem; one whose
biological attributes has intrigued naturalists for so long,
and whose very existence offers the people of Trinidad so
much.