Abstract:
Understanding the structure and stability characteristics of the plant community in karst antimony (Sb) mining area is of importance for the purpose of ecological restoration of the damaged area. The Sb mining area in Dachang town, Qinglong country, Guizhou Province was selected and surveyed in this study, where the vegetation restoration area of Sb mining and the no damaged area, but with similar vegetation as in the mining area, were set as the experimental group and the control group, respectively. The species diversity of plant communities and the Godron stability of the community, shrub layer, and herb layer were analyzed. Results showed that there were 22 recorded plant species in total, and 16 out of 22 were herbs, in the Sb mining area, belonging to 14 families and 18 genera, which were lower than the control sites with 68 species belonging to 30 families and 53 genera. The dicotyledons plants (11 families, 13 genera, and 17 species) accounted for 77.27% of the total species, and 2~4 species of Leguminosae, Poaceae, Compositae, Rosaceae and Urticaceae were recorded in the Sb mining area. The dominant plants were mainly
Betula luminifera,
Boehmeria nivea,
Buddleja officinalis,
Rubus parvifolius,
Boehmeria penduliflora, and
Rubus coreanus in the Sb mining area;
Vernicia fordii,
Populus simonii,
Populus adenopoda, and
Cinnamomum camphora are mainly dominant plants in the control sites. There was no significant difference in the density of trees and shrubs between the Sb mining area and the control sites; while the species number of plant height classes of 101~130 cm, 131~200 cm, and >200 cm in the Sb mining area were significantly lower than those in the control sites. The species richness of tree layer and shrub layer in the Sb mining area was significantly lowered by 82.8% and 89.5% than those in the control sites, respectively. The Shannon-Wiener index of tree layer and shrub layer in the Sb mining area was significantly lowered by 100% and 94.8%, respectively, relative to the control. The Godron stability suggests that the plant community in the Sb mining area was unstable. In summary, the simple species composition, and low and unstable species diversity of the Sb mining area indicate an early stage of succession in the plant community.