Contribution to the knowledge of the plant communities of the Caribbean-Cibensean Sector in the Dominican Republic

Abstract

The Caribbean-Cibensean Sector (Eastern Coastal Plain) is situated in the east of Santo Domingo (Dominican Republic). Despite intense tourist activity and farming, two types of forest can still be found in this area. This survey analyses the phytosociological profile of these forests. As a result of the heavy water losses in the underlying coral limestones, both the primary and the secondary forest undergo water stress and, consequently, there is no doubt that they are edaphoxerophilous. However, growing on deeper soils, the Chrysophyllo oliviformi-Sideroxyletum salicifolii primary forest undergoes less intense water stress than the Zamio debilis-Metopietum toxiferi secondary forest, which is a development of the former and appears as a result of the outcropping of coral limestones. Both forest formations are located in a pluviseasonal tropical, subhumid, infratropical macrobioclimate, but as a result of the xericity induced by the porous coral substrate and high potential evapotranspiration, these forests occasionally behave ambivalently, that is, either as climatophilous or edaphoxerophilous. The great number of endemic species and the high endangered level of some, such as Goetzea ekmanii O. E. Schulz, Peresquia quisqueyana Alain and Cubanola domingensis Aiello, lead us to propose that these two forest types be regarded as habitats worthy of preservation.