CHUVA DE SEMENTES EM FRAGMENTO DE FLORESTA ATLÂNTICA SEMIDECÍDUA

Abstract

Survival and dynamics of forests depend largely on the seed rain. Thus, studies on the densities of seed rain can provide important information for the conservation and management of forest fragments. The aim of this study was to evaluate the seed rain in a fragment of semideciduous Atlantic forest in southern Minas Gerais, Brazil, in order to: identify the species and frequency of seeds that were dispersed; and relations between the occurrence of seeds and the edge effect of the fragment, at different times. We used a nested model analysis of variance. We verified differences in frequency among times and between interior and edge, for some species. The most frequent species over the collections were Styrax sp., Ficus sp., Copaifera langsdorffii, Siparuna guianensis, Byrsonima crassifolia, Duguetia lanceolata.