Download or read book Vegetation of Southern Africa written by R. M. Cowling and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1997 with total page 656 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Comprehensive illustrated guide to plant science and ecology of southern African vegetation.
Download or read book Quaternary Vegetation Dynamics written by Jürgen Runge and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2021-11-28 with total page 412 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book celebrates the relaunch of the African Pollen Database, presents state-of-the-art of modern and ancient pollen data from sub-Saharan Africa, and promotes Open Access science. Pollen grains are powerful tools for the study of past vegetation dynamics because they preserve well within sedimentary deposits and have a huge diversity in ornamentation that allows different taxa to be determined. The reconstruction of past vegetation from the examination of ancient pollen records thus can be used to characterize the nature of past landscapes (e.g. abundance of forests vs. grasslands), provide insights into changes in biodiversity, and gain empirical evidence of vegetation response to climatic change and human activity. In this, the 35th Volume of "Palaeoecology of Africa", we bring together new data and extensive synthetic reviews to provide novel insights into the relationships between human evolution, human activity, climate change and vegetation dynamics during the Quaternary, the last 2.6 million years. Current and ongoing climate and land-use change is exerting pressure on modern vegetation formations and threatening the livelihoods and wellbeing of many peoples in Africa. In this book the focus is on the Quaternary because it is during this geological period that the modern vegetation formations developed into their current configurations against a backdrop of high magnitude global climate change (glacial-interglacial cycles), human evolution, and a growing human land-use footprint. In this book the latest information is presented and collated from around the African continent to parameterize past vegetation states, identify the drivers of vegetation change, and assess the vegetation resilience to change. To achieve this research from two broad themes are covered: (i) the present is the key to the past (i.e. studies which improve our understanding of modern environments so that we can better interpret evidence from the past), and (ii) the past is the key to the future (i.e. studies which unlock information on how and why vegetation changed in the past so one can better anticipate trajectories of future change). This Open Access book will provide a strong foundation for future research exploring past ecological, environmental and climatic change within Africa and the surrounding islands. The book is organized regionally (covering western, eastern, central, and southern Africa) and it contains specialized articles focused on particular topics (such as modern pollen-vegetation relationships and fire as a driver of vegetation change), as well as regional and pan-African syntheses drawing together decades of research to assess key scientific questions (including the role of climate in driving vegetation change and the role of vegetation change in human evolution). These articles will be useful to students and teachers from high school to the highest level of university who are interested in the origins and dynamics of vegetation in Africa. Furthermore, it is also meant to provide societally relevant information that can act as an inspiration for the development of sustainable management practices for the future.
Download or read book The Dry Forests and Woodlands of Africa written by Emmanuel N. Chidumayo and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-09-23 with total page 294 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The dry forests and woodlands of Sub-Saharan Africa are major ecosystems, with a broad range of strong economic and cultural incentives for keeping them intact. However, few people are aware of their importance, compared to tropical rainforests, despite them being home to more than half of the continent's population. This unique book brings together scientific knowledge on this topic from East, West, and Southern Africa and describes the relationships between forests, woodlands, people and their livelihoods. Dry forest is defined as vegetation dominated by woody plants, primarily trees, the canopy of which covers more than 10 per cent of the ground surface, occurring in climates with a dry season of three months or more. This broad definition - wider than those used by many authors - incorporates vegetation types commonly termed woodland, shrubland, thicket, savanna, wooded grassland, as well as dry forest in its strict sense. The book provides a comparative analysis of management experiences from the different geographic regions, emphasizing the need to balance the utilization of dry forests and woodland products between current and future human needs. Further, the book explores the techniques and strategies that can be deployed to improve the management of African dry forests and woodlands for the benefit of all, but more importantly, the communities that live off these vegetation formations. Thus, the book lays a foundation for improving the management of dry forests and woodlands for the wide range of products and services they provide.
Download or read book Only in Africa written by Norman Owen-Smith and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-10-07 with total page 379 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Demonstrates how Africa's physical features, savannas and abundant grazers enabled frugivorous apes to become savanna-living hunters.
Download or read book Conservation Biology in Sub Saharan Africa written by Richard Primack and published by Open Book Publishers. This book was released on 2019-09-10 with total page 712 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Conservation Biology in Sub-Saharan Africa comprehensively explores the challenges and potential solutions to key conservation issues in Sub-Saharan Africa. Easy to read, this lucid and accessible textbook includes fifteen chapters that cover a full range of conservation topics, including threats to biodiversity, environmental laws, and protected areas management, as well as related topics such as sustainability, poverty, and human-wildlife conflict. This rich resource also includes a background discussion of what conservation biology is, a wide range of theoretical approaches to the subject, and concrete examples of conservation practice in specific African contexts. Strategies are outlined to protect biodiversity whilst promoting economic development in the region. Boxes covering specific themes written by scientists who live and work throughout the region are included in each chapter, together with recommended readings and suggested discussion topics. Each chapter also includes an extensive bibliography. Conservation Biology in Sub-Saharan Africa provides the most up-to-date study in the field. It is an essential resource, available on-line without charge, for undergraduate and graduate students, as well as a handy guide for professionals working to stop the rapid loss of biodiversity in Sub-Saharan Africa and elsewhere.
Download or read book Oxford Bibliographies written by and published by . This book was released on with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Tropical Rain Forest written by Marius Jacobs and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 310 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In recent years, tropical forests have received more attention and have been the subject of greater environmental concern than any other kind of vegetation. There is an increasing public awareness of the importance of these forests, not only as a diminishing source of countless products used by mankind, nor for their effects on soil stabilization and climate, but as unrivalled sources of what today we call biodiversity. Threats to the continued existence of the forests represent threats to tens of thousands of species of organisms, both plants and animals. It is all the more surprising, therefore, that there have been no major scientific accounts published in recent years since the classic handbook by Paul W. Richards, The Tropical Rain Forest in 1952. Some excellent popular accounts of tropical rain forests have been published including Paul Richard's The Life of the Jungle, and Catherine Caulfield's In the Rainforest and Jungles, edited by Edward Ayensu. There have been numerous, often conflicting, assessments of the rate of conversion of tropical forests to other uses and explanations of the underlying causes, and in 1978 UNESCO/UNEPI FAO published a massive report, The Tropical Rain Forest, which, although full of useful information, is highly selective and does not fully survey the enormous diversity of the forests.
Download or read book The Miombo in Transition written by Bruce Morgan Campbell and published by CIFOR. This book was released on 1996-01-01 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Miombo woodlands and their use: overview and key issues. The ecology of miombo woodlands. Population biology of miombo tree. Miombo woodlands in the wider context: macro-economic and inter-sectoral influences. Rural households and miombo woodlands: use, value and management. Trade in woodland products from the miombo region. Managing miombo woodland. Institutional arrangements governing the use and the management of miombo woodlands. Miombo woodlands and rural livelihoods: options and opportunities.
Download or read book Vegetation history written by B. Huntley and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 808 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The analysis of vegetation history is one of the prime objectives for vegetation scientists. In order to understand the recent composition of local floras and plant communities a second knowledge of species com position during recent millenia is essential. With the present concern over climate changes, due to human activities, an understanding of past vegeta tion distribution becomes even more important, since the correlation between climate and vegetation can often be used to predict possible impacts to crops and forests. I was very fortunate to receive the help of Drs. Webb and Huntley to compile this volume on vegetation history. They have collated an impres sive set of papers which together give an account of the vegetation history of most of the continents during the late-Tertiary and Quaternery periods. There are, however, gaps in the coverage achieved, most notably Africa, and Asia apart from Japan. The information in this book will nonetheless certainly be used widely by vegetation scientists for the regions covered in the book and much of it has relevance to the areas not explicitly described. The authors of the individual chapters have done their best to cover recent topics of interest as well as established facts. It is intended that a separate volume will be produced in the near future covering the vegetation history of Africa and Asia. I thank the editors of It fits well into the this volume for their commendable achievement.
Download or read book Mangrove Ecosystems written by Volker Linneweber and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-06-29 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Protection of the environment has nowadays become a major challenge and a condi tion for survival of future human generations and life on Earth in general. Yet it is still far too much of a dream or hope rather than a reality in the policy of our societies. Presently we are experiencing an unprecedented exponential growth of demography combined with a race for profit, resulting in excessive consumption particularly of en ergy, and a serious impact on the world ecosystems. Various types of pollutants and emerging new diseases not only disrupt the normal course of life, but also above this some of the atmospheric pollutants are most likely involved in the changing climate. We fear and literally shiver at the thought that the "changing climate" would ultimately disrupt the fragile thermodynamic equilibrium between the atmosphere and the oceans. Are we insensitive to these facts to the point of pushing our descendants, some genera tions ahead, into a new glacial period after a first period of warming up, at least, in northern Europe, like the one that took place 13 to 14 millennia ago? Surely the planet's nature is not prepared to be dominated by man and will go its way, whether humanity will be alive or dead.
Download or read book Vegetation Ecology of Remnant Afromontane Forests on the Central Plateau of Shewa Ethiopia written by Tamrat Bekele and published by . This book was released on 1993 with total page 64 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Atlas of the Potential Vegetation of Ethiopia written by Ib Friis and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A new map of the potential vegetation types of Ethiopia has been produced at the scale of 1:2,000,000. It is published here as an atlas with 29 map plates. The map shows the distribution of twelve potential vegetation types that can be mapped using environmental parameters and GIS methodology. In the accompanying text these vegetation types have been described and further divided into a number of subtypes. The types and subtypes are: (1) Desert and semi-desert scrubland. (2) Acacia-Commiphora woodland and bushland (with the subtypes (2a) Acacia-Commiphora woodland and bushland proper and (2b) Acacia wooded grassland of the Rift Valley). (3) Wooded grassland of the western Gambela region. (4) Combretum-Terminalia woodland and wooded grassland. (5) Dry evergreen Afromontane forest and grassland complex (with the subtypes (5a) Undifferentiated Afromontane forest, (5b) Dry single-dominant Afromontane forest of the Ethiopian highlands, (5c) Afromontane woodland, wooded grassland and grassland, (5d) Transition between Afromontane vegetation and Acacia-Commiphora bushland on the Eastern escarpment). (6) Moist evergreen Afromontane forest (with the subtypes (6a) Primary or mature secondary moist evergreen Afromontane forest, and (6b) Edges of moist evergreen Afromontane forest, bushland, woodland and wooded grassland). (7) Transitional rain forest. (8) Ericaceous belt. (8) Afroalpine belt. (10) Riverine vegetation. (11) Fresh-water lakes, etc. (with the subtypes (11a) Fresh-water lake vegetation (open water) and (11b) Freshwater marshes and swamps, floodplains and lake shore vegetation). (12) Salt lakes, etc. (with the subtypes (12a) Salt lake vegetation (open water) and (12b) Salt pans, saline brackish and intermittent wetlands and salt-lake shore vegetation)"--Synopsis.
Download or read book Field Guide to Common Trees Shrubs of East Africa written by Najma Dharani and published by Penguin Random House South Africa. This book was released on 2019-03-01 with total page 1561 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fully updated and expanded, this third edition of the top-selling Field Guide to Common Trees & Shrubs of East Africa now features more than 520 of the trees and shrubs – indigenous and naturalized exotics – commonly found in the region. Each of the four sections – trees, shrubs, palms and mangroves – is arranged in alphabetical order according to scientific name. The book features: an informative introduction to families. Species accounts describing the plants’ habitat, bark, leaves, flowers and fruit. General and commercial applications and uses in traditional medicine. Almost 2,000 photographs depicting the species, its fruit, flowers and bark. Glossaries, both textual and illustrated, of botanical and medical terms. An invaluable ID guide to the trees and shrubs in gardens, parks and along roadsides of East Africa.
Download or read book Africa written by United Nations Environment Programme and published by UNEP/Earthprint. This book was released on 2008 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This stunning 400-page Atlas is a unique and powerful publication which brings to light stories of environmental change at more than 100 locations spread across every country in Africa. There are more than 300 satellite images, 300 ground photographs and 150 maps, along with informative graphs and charts that give a vivid visual portrayal of Africa and its changing environment that provide scientific evidence of the impact that natural and human activities have had on the continent's environment over the past several decades. The observations and measurements of environmental change help gauge the extent of progress made by African countries towards reaching the United Nation's Millennium Development Goals. More importantly, this book contributes to the knowledge and understanding that are essential for adaptation and remediation, and should be of immense value to all those who want to know more about Africa and who care about the future of this continent.
Download or read book Use and Conservation of the Biosphere written by Unesco and published by . This book was released on 1970 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book NATURAL CHANGE HUMAN IMPACT written by GOODMAN STEVEN M and published by Smithsonian Books (DC). This book was released on 1997-03-17 with total page 458 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A miniature continent long isolated from the African mainland, the island of Madagascar evolved a biota that remains one of the most varied of any environment in the world. Bringing together the work of the most innovative conservation and evolutionary biologists, geologists, and anthropologists currently working in Madagascar, this book provides the first overview in more than twenty years of how natural and human-induced changes have molded the island's modern ecosystems. Natural Change and Human Impact in Madagascar reflects new methods for understanding biotic and environmental change worldwide.
Download or read book Biological Relationships Between Africa and South America written by Peter Goldblatt and published by . This book was released on 1993-01-01 with total page 630 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
