Fig 1.
Map of Mpohor Wassa East district of Ghana showing the Hwini-Butre/Benso Golden Star exploratory area where the study was conducted.
Fig 2.
Rarefaction curves for overstorey tree species in three reclaimed mine lands and one control (natural forest) site.
Straight lines represent species richness dash (-—-) or dotted (…) lines indicate the 95% confidence interval for the lower and upper boundaries. G-Zone, S-West, and S-East represent the reclaimed sites.
Table 1.
Species diversity characteristics of the overstorey, mid-storey and understorey vegetation on reclaimed (n = 24) and adjacent natural forest (control n = 3) sites.
Fig 3.
Correspondence analysis biplot showing species distribution among different vegetation strata in reclaimed and natural forest stands.
OC, MC, and UC = overstorey, midstorey, and understorey species respectively on control sites, and OR, MR, and UR = overstorey, midstorey, and understorey species respectively on reclaimed sites. Axes 1 and 2 explained 33.5 and 29.7% of the total variation, respectively. List of species: AM—Acacia mangium, AL—Acridocarpus longifolius, AS—Alternanthera sessilis, AO—Angylocalyx oligophyllus, AC—Alchornea cordifolia, AB—Alstonia boonei, AR—Adenia rumicifolia, AV—Adiantum vogelii, AN—Agelaea nitida, AP—Allanblackia parviflora, AmP—Amphimas pterocarpoides, AS—Aningeria spp, AnN—Anthocleista nobilis, AnM—Anthonotha macrophylla, AA—Artocarpus altalis, AsA—Aspilia Africana, AsC—A cordifolia, AnS—Anthonotha sassandraensis, AT—Antiaris toxicaria, AnL—Antidesma laciniatum, AG—Asystasia gangetica, AJ—Aulacocalyx jasminiflora, BB—Bombax buonopozense, BN—Baphia nitida, BP–B. pubescens, BM—Beilschmiedia mannii, BT—Berlinia tomentella, BW—Blighia welwitschii, BD—Brachiaria deflexa, BA—Bridelia atroviridis, CO—Cedrela odorata,CP—Ceiba pentandra, CG—Cola gigantean, CB—Calpocalyx brevibracteatus, CaP—Carapa procera, CC—Cola caricifolia, CR—Combretum racemosum, CA—Calycobolus africanus, CeP—Centrosema pubescens, ChO–Chromolaena odorata, CF—Clappertonia ficifolia, CS—Clerodendrum splendens, CuS—Culcasia saxatilis, DG–Desmodiu gangetium, DD—Dialium dinklagei, DK—Diospyros kamerunensis, EA—Entandrophragma angolense, EC—E. cylindicum, EG—Elaeis guineensis, EH—Euphorbia heterophylla, FA—Funtumia africana, FE–F. elastic, FS—Ficus sur, GB—Glyphaea brevis,GO—Geophila obvallata, GL—Gongronema latifolium, GM—Grewia malacocarpa, GF—Griffonia simplicifolia, GA—Gmelina arborea, GC—Guarea cedrata, HP—Heisteria parvifolia, HM—Harungana madagascariensis, HU—Heritiera utilis, HK—Hannoa klaineana, HF—Holarrhena floribunda, HL—Homalium letestui, HO—Hoslundia opposite, IC—Imperata cylindrica, II—Ipomoea involucrate, JF—Justicia flava, LB—Leptoderris brachyptera, LD—Landolphia dulcis, LW—Lannea welwitschii, MP—Microsorum punctatum, MiP—- Microdesmis puberula, MR—Millettia rhodantha, MZ—Millettia zechiana, KI—Khaya ivorensis, LL—Leucaena leucocephala, MiR—Milicia regia, MS—Mitragyna spp, MB—Macaranga barteri, MH—Macaranga hurifolia, MaB—Maesobotrya barteri, MA—Maranthes aubrevillei, MM—Mareya micrantha, MPu—Mimosa pudica, MD—Margaritaria discoidea, MoM—Monodora myristica, MC—Musanga cecropioides, MyL—Myrianthus libericus, MG—Motandra guineensis, OG—Olax gambecola, ND—Nauclea diderichii, PA—Piptadenistrum africana, PyA—Pycnnanthus angolensis, PM—Panicum maximum, PB—Parkia bicolor, NV—Napoleonaea vogelii, NL—Newbouldia laevis, PN—Parquetina nigrescens, PeM—Petersianthus macrocarpus, PuM—Pueraria montana, PS—Psydrax subcordata, RV—Rauvolfia vomitoria, RH—Ricinodendron heudelotii, Rinorea oblongifolia, RK—Rinorea kibbiensis, RC—Rottboellia cochinchinensis, SK—Scottelia klaineana, SC—Spathodea campanulata, SO—Sterculia oblonga, SS—Senna siamea, SB—Scleria boivinii, SA—Secamone afzelii, SiA—Sida acuta, SiC—Sida corymbosa, SmA—Smilax anceps, SmK—Smilax kraussiana, SV—Spermacoce verticillata, ST—Sterculia tragacantha, TG—Tectona grandis, Terminalia ivorensis, TS–T. superba, TH—Tieghemella heckelii, TrS—Triplochiton scleroxylon, TA—Tabernaemontana africana, TD—Tetrorchidium didymostemon, TM—Trichilia monadelpha, UR—Urera rigida, VC—Vernonia conferta, VF—Vitex ferruginea, VA—Voacanga africana, XS—Xylopia staudtii, ZC—Zanthoxylum chevalieri, and ZG—Zanthoxylum gilletii.
Table 2.
Top five most common species in the three strata of the two site types.
Table 3.
Jaccards and Bray-Curtis similarity indices among species in the overstorey, midstorey, and understorey of reclaimed (rehabilitated) and control (neighbouring natural forest).
Values above the diagonal represent Jaccard’s indices and values below the diagonal are Bray-Curtis values. Values in bold indicate high similarity between site-stratum types.
Fig 4.
Diversity profiles of overstorey, midstorey and understorey floral species in the rehabilitated and control sites using Renyi’s index family.
OC, MC, and UC are respectively overstorey, midstorey, and understorey species in the control sites while OR, MR, and UR are respectively overstorey, midstorey, and understorey species on the rehabilitated sites. Thick lines represent main diversity profiles.
Fig 5.
Rank-abundance geometric series curves (models) applied to overstorey, midstorey, and understorey flora species in the reclaimed and control sites.
Figures OC–overstorey control, OR–overstorey on reclaimed sites, MC–midstorey on control site, MR–midstorey on reclaimed site, UC–understorey on control site, and UR–understorey on reclaimed sites.
Table 4.
Summary of chi-square statistics for the geometric series model applied on the reclaimed and natural forest (control) sites.
Table 5.
Average abundance (seedlings/ha) of understorey plants among four guild types on reclaimed and control sites.
Table 6.
Stand characteristics of the reclaimed and control (natural forest) sites surveyed.