Impact of waste water discharge on the plant communities and size structure of Wadi El‐Shees, Al‐Jabal Al‐Akhdar, Libya

Abstract

AbstractThe present study assesses the impact of waste water discharge on the plant communities and size structure of the common woody species in Wadi El‐Shees, Al‐Jabal Al‐Akhdar, Libya. Thirty stands were selected along two adjacent tributaries (polluted and un‐polluted) in Wadi El‐Shees. Sixty‐five species belonging to 60 genera and 34 families were recorded, predominated with therophytes and mono‐regional taxa and only one endemic species (Arbutus pavarii). The application of TWINSPAN on the data set, led to the recognition of 4 vegetation groups, two represented each of the polluted and un‐polluted regions. Soils of the polluted area have significant higher values of organic matter, salinity, chloride and iron. Ten common woody perennials were selected for estimating the variation in their size structure in the polluted and un‐polluted tributaries. These species include one shrublet, two shrubs and 7 trees. It was found that the density and volume of all species except A. pavarii and Sarcopoterium spinosum were higher in the polluted than the un‐polluted area. Four size distributions were recognized: inverse J‐shaped, bell‐shaped, positive and negative skewed distributions. It was concluded that pollution had significant impact on the plant density and sizes structure of the common woody plants in Wadi El‐Shees. Such study may help in managing and conserving plant diversity in Northern Libya. (© 2014 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)